


Behind the Masks- Miraculous Ladybug

by Giggitygalsunite



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-06
Updated: 2018-10-06
Packaged: 2019-07-27 04:16:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 34,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16211222
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Giggitygalsunite/pseuds/Giggitygalsunite
Summary: Marinette, along with the rest of her class, participate in a school production of Romeo and Juliet, causing Marinette and Adrien to have to, once again, act romantic towards each other in front of the whole class. But when things don’t work out quite as either of them expected, Hawkmoth uses it to his advantages, akumatizing his butler Nathalie into Lady Mourntague. With interactions between all four couples in the love square Marinette and Adrien have to discover how they really feel about each other, in and out of the masks.





	Behind the Masks- Miraculous Ladybug

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this fanfiction directly after the release of Sandboy so there was no akumatized Nathalie prior to writing this. It’s been confirmed that there will be an akumatized Nathalie at the end of season 2 but mine was written before and therefore was not based off of her at all. (And probably won’t be as cool so sorry.)

“Chat! Quick!” Ladybug hollered. “The akuma’s in her chalk!”  
Chat Noir peered over at the newest akumatized villain of Paris, The Chalkmaster, formerly Ms.Mendeliev, and his eyes lit up with understanding.   
Earlier that day Marc and Nathaniel had been locked in an intense conversation about Ladybug and Chat Noir. Marc had asked how Chat would react if Ladybug really were to end up with the Mightyllustrator instead of him, ending in them discussing what an akumatized Chat Noir would act and look like.   
The conversation had disturbed Marinette, partially because she didn’t want anything to do with Chat Noir, let alone the fictional Mightyllustrator. Then again, it wasn’t as if she could have actually explained that without seeming suspicious, and it wasn’t her place to disrupt anyway, so she had let them be. Ms.Mendeleiev had walked in the class and started her lecture, her mouth turned down into a distinct frown as usual. It hadn’t taken long for Marinette to realize she was in a worse mood than she was most days, which was saying a lot. So it was hardly came as a surprise when she had stormed out of the room, fists clenched and stream practically pouring out of her ears when Marc and Nathaniel hadn’t realized she’d come in and had ended up still chatting mid-lesson.   
What had been a surprise, however, was when she had stormed back into the room, this time with a white cape, rather than her lab coat, her purple hair swirled up into two menacing horns, and a pitch black mask and stilettos replacing her usual glasses and coral flats. She had held a piece of chalk in her hands that had been transformed into an elaborate sword made entirely of the white substance.   
Marinette had used the panic that had occurred to her advantage, slipping out of the room whilst everyone else had raced back and forth like chickens with their heads cut off. When she had re-entered the room Chat Noir was already there, leaning casually against the wall as if there wasn’t another villain to deal with, and spinning his tail, a cocky smirk on his face.  
“How’s my buggaboo doing?” He’d asked.   
Before she had been able to correct him, and possibly slap him so hard that stupid grin disappeared from his face, The Chalkmaster had aimed her sword at Marc, who had stared innocently up from his notebook, only for the villain to blast a stream of chalk towards him. Marc had let out a squeak, but before the stream could hit him Nathaniel had leapt in front of him, causing him to turn into an eerie chalk statue. Marc had stared, horrified, and tried to touch Nathaniel, which had only accomplished disintegrating him into little more than a white pile at Marc’s feet.  
And now they were here.  
Chat’s eyes were still wide from the shock of what had happened to Nathaniel as she shouted out her instructions. He shook his head and raced forwards at the same time as her feet began moving.   
The Chalkmaster laughed. “You ungrateful students never appreciated me, and now you’ll never have the chance to learn anything ever again!” she cackled.   
The Chalkmaster spun around to Ladybug and aimed her sword, but she lunged out of the way, the chalk spray missing her by inches. She crouched down, spinning her yoyo until it was wrapped completely around the villain’s leg. She yanked, and The Chalkmaster let out a yelp, crashing to the ground. Chat used his rod to volt himself over her sprawled body so he was on her right, where he leaned down and swiftly grabbed the chalk sword from out of her hands. The Chalkmaster screamed in protest and reached towards him, grabbing his ankle, causing him to stumble backwards in order to get away. He tripped and clattered to the ground. The Chalkmaster began dragging him towards her, a newfound fire in her cold blue eyes.  
Frustration flooded Ladybug and she shouted, “Lucky Charm!” accessing her power. A moment later, an empty slingshot landed in her hand. She blinked at it in confusion, only to look around the room and see a makeup compact sitting on Chloe’s desk. She grabbed it, snapped it shut, and put it in the slingshot. She drew back the rubber, and launched the compact so that it smacked into The Chalkmasters hand, causing her to let go of Chat Noir, and whip around to face Ladybug with a snarl. Chat Noir lifted himself back up in seconds, shouting ‘Cataclysm!’ the moment he was on his feet. The Chalkmaster screamed out ‘No!’ but it was too late. The chalk sword crumbled apart, leaving a small black butterfly to flutter out casually as if it’s evil power hadn’t just consumed an innocent civilian to such a dangerous extent.   
“Time to de-evilize!” Ladybug cried, whipping her yoyo forward and catching the wicked bug within it’s cleansing light. She caught the yoyo again, releasing a white butterfly into the sky. “Bye bye little butterfly,” she murmured, satisfaction rippling through her, along with a quiet sigh of relief. Another akumatized villain saved in just a matter of minutes. Today was a good day to be saving Paris. Not to mention she got to miss a big chunk of Physics class today. She smiled, then threw the slingshot towards the ceiling, exclaiming, “Miraculous Ladybug!”   
Just like that, everything was set back to normal. Nathaniel reformed, hand in hand with Marc who had been desperately crying for him. The two of them stared at each other for a second, then blinked and blushed rapidly, before pulling their hands away and smiling nervously as they returned to their seats. Chloe’s compact mirror had been dented upon contact, but it repaired itself. Ladybug half wished it hadn’t.   
Finally, The Chalkmaster was surrounding by a dark cloud, reverting her back to Ms.Mendeleiev once again. Chat Noir crossed over to Ladybug, and this time she smiled at him. Awkward friend-zoning aside, they were partners, and she loved him, however platonically. He extended his hand and they fist bumped.  
“Pound it!” They said in perfect unison. Perfect. They were always a perfect team, and today was no exception. Chat Noir began to leave the room and she walked with him until they both turned separate corners so as not to see each other’s secret identities.   
Suddenly she heard “Ladybug?” She turned to see that Chat was staring after her, biting his lip nervously.   
“Yes, Chat?” she asked, suddenly a little concerned.   
“I… Nevermind,” he said slowly, and she laughed lightly, watching him turn away once more. She, too, kept walking, until suddenly, she heard him exclaim, “Marinette?”   
She turned. “What is it this time kitty?” She froze. “I mean…” Her cheeks began to flush with the heat and weight of her mistake. She expected him to stare at her, or freak out, or do something, but instead he just repeated the question.   
“Marinette?” he said. Then again, “Marinette? Marinette? Marinette?”  
A chill crept up her spine and she backed away, fear building up in her stomach. What was wrong with Chat Noir? Had he been akumatized after all? He certainly wasn’t normal… Not to mention he now knew her secret identity.   
“Marinette?!”   
Marinette snapped her eyes open. Everything was blurry and odd and it took her a second to realize where she was. She was sitting in Miss Bustier’s class, next to Alya. Alya who had been shaking her shoulders and calling her name. But The Chalkmaster… No. She had fought The Chalkmaster last week. There hadn’t been any other akumatized victims since. Tikki had suggested she take some Marinette time for herself because of the safe period of time, so she had begun working hard on another album cover that Jagged Stone had asked her to create.   
Unfortunately, she had kept getting distracted by Alya with constant updates on where Adrien happened to be at the moment, resulting in them running all around town almost every day that week. The deadline for the Jagged Stone cover was today so she had stayed up until five in the morning last night working on it, giving her only about an hour of sleep to go off of. That’s why she had been tired enough that she had fallen asleep, and dreamed about The Chalkmaster battle.   
But why The Chalkmaster? She hadn’t even been that interesting of a villain compared to those that her and Chat had fought before. She groaned slightly. She must be getting really anxious for another villain. She never thought that Hawkmoth’s devious attempts at stealing their miraculous could be a good thing, and yet, she really missed fighting the villains. Maybe she missed Chat a little bit too.   
“Marinette, what’s up with you today?” Alya asked from her side.   
“Oh… I was up all night designing Jagged Stone’s album cover, so I didn’t really sleep much last night,” Marinette slurred in response.   
Alya just rolled her eyes. “What were you thinking, girl? Today is a terrible day to be tired? You need to get hyped!”  
Marinette blinked, running through every possible scenario that would require her getting hyped. Adrien’s birthday had been a few months ago so it couldn’t be that. Adrien’s next fashion shoot wasn’t for another week and Valentine’s day wasn’t for at least half a year. Besides, based on how her last Valentine’s day had been spent kissing Chat Noir and not Adrien she didn’t expect very much out of the holiday this time. Finally, she gave up and asked, “Why? What’s today?”  
“The school play audition results are being announced today!” Alya said and Marinette caught the look of disappointment she gave her for not remembering.  
Marinette face-palmed, suddenly feeling like an idiot, not to mention a terrible friend. Alya had spent every day for a solid week preparing for the school play this year, because she claimed that Chloe always got the best roles, just because of her father’s position as Mayor, and she wasn’t going to let it happen again. Considering that the play was Romeo and Juliet, Marinette had absolutely no complaints to Chloe not getting the lead, considering the fact that anyone in their right mind knew Adrien would no doubt get Romeo. After all. he was perfect for the part, and had experience acting - at least, if you could count photo-shoots as experience.   
Marinette hadn’t wanted to audition, but Alya had forced her too, using Adrien as bait, because she would get to kiss him if she got Juliet. She doubted she was going to land the lead, but if there was even the chance to kiss Adrien she had to try, so she had auditioned. As tired as she was, she couldn’t help but perk up when she saw Ms. Bustier walk through the door, holding a sheet of paper with a list of all the assigned roles on it.   
Usually the art teacher was in charge of school plays, but unfortunately he was on vacation to the Bahamas and would be out for a few months, meaning he’d miss the school play. The students had all been devastated to see him going, given how well liked he was, and many of them had still wanted to be involved in the production. Like a saint, Ms. Bustier had rose up to the task, willing to do whatever she could to please her students, as usual.   
“Mr. Damocles instructed me to announce the roles at the end of class, but I’m sure you’re all very eager to hear your new positions, so I’ll bend the rules just the tiniest bit, and tell you now,” she said with a pure smile.   
A cheer rang up in the classroom which she quickly quieted as she began reading off the roles. Romeo was going to be played by Adrien, as Marinette - and basically the whole class for that matter- had previously expected. Nino clapped him on the back proudly at the announcement only for his eyes to widen as Ms.Bustier announced his name for the role of Mercutio, Romeo’s closest friend. Adrien’s eyes lit up, and he shoved Nino lightly, who sat stunned. His face stayed perfectly still with surprise, only for him to blink as Alya was announced to be playing the role of Juliet. Marinette could practically see the realization setting in that his girlfriend and best friend were going to have to kiss, but then he shook his head, and turned to flash a quick thumbs up at Alya. Alya squealed and grabbed Marinette’s shoulders, shaking her hard.  
“Did you hear that?” she gushed. “Did you hear that? I’m Juliet! I’m Juliet!” She giggled happily and Marinette wrapped her arms around her and squeezed tightly, pride for her friend practically overflowing. Alya deserved that role. Alya nearly smacked her in the face as she threw her arms upward in victory, meanwhile Chloe sulked in the background, as her role as The Nurse was explained.   
“What!” she snapped. “I got Juliet’s nurse! I was supposed to get Juliet! This is ridiculous! Utterly ridiculous!” She crossed her arms, and Sabrina patted her on the shoulder, only to jump as she was told her role of Lady Capulet.   
Ms. Bustier went through the rest of the list quickly, announcing that Max would play Friar, Ivan would play Tybalt, Kim would play Paris, Nathaniel would play Montague, Marc would play Benvolio, Mylene would play the Chorus, and Juleka would play Lady Capulet . She then explained that due to a lack of female parts, Alix would be playing Balthasar and Rose would be playing Capulet. Marinette could have sworn she saw Juleka blush as she realized that that meant her and Rose would be married in the play, but it went away so quickly she may have simply imagined it.  
She frowned as Ms. Bustier began wrapping up the list without ever saying the word ‘Marinette.’ She read off names of students from other classes, as well, but still, no Marinette. Finally, Ms. Bustier began the lesson and Marinette couldn’t help but sigh. “I didn’t get in,” she muttered solemnly to Alya, shocked at how much this was affecting her when she hadn’t wanted to try out in the first place.   
Alya blinked, then shrugged, saying, “I got you girl.” Her hand shot upwards and Ms. Bustier stopped and turned towards her.  
“Yes, Alya?”  
“Excuse me, I hate to interrupt the lesson, but Marinette’s name wasn’t read. I just wanted to make sure there was no mistake, considering there are a lot of parts and my girl Marinette here is very talented, if I do say so myself.”  
“Alya!” Marinette hissed, sinking into her chair as her cheeks flared up red.  
“Very talented? You’ve got to be kidding me,” Chloe barked, then proceeded to crack up laughing.   
Ms. Bustier frowned, looking down at the list. When she looked back up she had a smile on her face. “Actually Ms. Bourgeois, Alya is right. I’m so sorry Marinette, I must have missed your name on the list. You are going to be playing the role of Lady Montague, Romeo’s mother.”  
A spark of happiness lit up within her as she heard the words, only for a jolt of disappointment right afterwards. Romeo’s mother. Mother. She didn’t want Adrien to think of her as a mother. She let out a groan and buried her hands in her face, as Ayla perched an angelic, “Thank you Ms. Bustier.”  
“Hey,” a voice that most certainly wasn’t Alya said. Marinette’s head popped up, and her eyes widened as she realized the voice belonged to Adrien. Adrien. “Congratulations Marinette. I was sure you’d get in,” he said with a smile that melted her heart. She nearly squealed, the green of his eyes so deep despite the light that flickered within them when he looked at her.   
“I, ur, you’re you. I mean… Thank welcome. I MEAN… yes.”  
“Yes?” Adrien asked, amusement flickering across his perfect face.  
“Yes,” she squeaked, and he chuckled lightly, before turning back to Ms. Bustier as she began to talk once again.  
Marinette couldn’t pay attention the to lecture. Her head was too full of different images. First she saw her Jagged Stone album cover. Then she saw Chat Noir’s small smile as he fist-bumped her, only to imagine once again the creepy version of him saying her name- her true name- over and over again like a broken record. Then she saw Adrien’s smile as he looked at her and heard those words like a lullaby singing her to sleep. Congratulations Marinette. I was sure you’d get in. Congratulations Marinette. Marinette… Marinette… Mari-   
Before she could process it she fell asleep at her desk, and didn’t wake up until the end of school when Alya walked her home, letting her lean her tired head against her shoulder the whole way there. And it was when Marinette had finally crashed down on her bed, waving softly to Alya as she made her way out of her room and out of her parent’s bakery, that Marinette knew with absolute certainty that her dear friend would make the perfect Juliet Capulet. 

 

The next few weeks were spent in a blur of Marinette helping Alya with her lines after school on all the days they didn’t have rehearsal - and most of the days they did - and fawning over Adrien every time he said a romantic line to Alya, who did her best to look flattered and deeply intoxicated. When she had finally mastered the starry eyed gaze and blushing cheeks Marinette asked how she accomplished it and she just laughed and said she picked up on the way Marinette ogled at Adrien on the day to day and decided to put some of it into her acting. The next day Ms. Bustier commenting on how Alya was playing the part to utter perfection and was succeeding in looking head over heels over Romeo so much she almost believed it just watching them rehearse, to which Alya responded by flashing Marinette a knowing wink.  
Finally, after so many days spent reading over the same lines, rehearsing endless amounts of blocking, and being forced to play the awkward role of Adrien’s mother, much to the delight of Chloe, tech week had finally arrived. Marinette had never been in a show before so she had no idea how the dynamic of tech week worked, only that recurring actors such as Chloe and Alya insisted it was an actor’s nightmare. She didn’t know about that, but what she did know was that the hours required for rehearsal were absolutely ridiculous, so she hoped that no akumatized villains showed up, because right now her responsibility as Lady Montague was enough, let alone her responsibilities as Ladybug. Unfortunately, she doubted Hawkmoth would be willing to send out his akumas according to Marinette’s schedule, so all she could really do at the moment was hope.  
Marinette filed into the room on the first day of tech week, only for Nathaniel to come up to her, starry eyed.   
“H-Hi Marinette,” he stuttered, tingling his fingers in a little wave.  
“Hey Nathaniel. What’s up?” she asked lightly.  
“You excited to be playing a couple in front of a live audience next week?” he said with a grin.   
Marinette blinked, suppressing the groan that threatened to overflow into reality. Over the course of the show getting to know her other classmates more had been extremely fun, but she still wished someone else had gotten the role of Montague, considering Nathaniel’s past crush on her. A crush that hadn’t seemed to have fully gone away… To make matters worse, when she looked out at the audience in nearly every scene her and Nathaniel were in together, Marc was nowhere to be found.   
One day she had stepped outside to get a drink of water on her five minute break, only to see Marc huddled beneath the stairs writing like he used to before him and Nathaniel had become close. Now she typically saw him and Nathaniel with each other everywhere, sometimes with Alix tagging along as well. The three of them were inseparable. So why had Marc been back under the stairs all alone? When she had asked him what was wrong he had just shrugged and insisted it was nothing but she could have sworn she had seen out of the corner of her eyes the names Nathaniel and Marinette written in his notebook.  
That had seemed unusual considering that most of his stories dealt with Ladybug and Chat Noir. Then she had noticed that his usual notebook had been sitting closed at his side. The notebook he had been holding was… His diary. When Marc had caught her looking he had gotten extremely embarrassed, trying to shut the notebook, only to seem to reconsider, and sigh. She had blinked as he had handed her the diary.   
“You’re a good friend Marinette,” he had said softly. “If anyone were to find out, it should be you.”   
She had scanned over the page quickly, gasping as she read sentences that said. I just hope my crush on Nathaniel isn’t too obvious. I don’t want anyone to find out. Except maybe Marinette, but that’s only if I absolutely need to tell someone. When she had handed the book back to Marc he was avoiding her eyes, and she could have sworn she saw him wipe away a singular tear from off his face. Her heart had ached for him, but swelled up with happiness at the same time.   
No wonder Marc had been akumatized because of Nathaniel’s rejection. Not only were they wonderful partners like her and Chat Noir, but he also had a secret crush like hers on Adrien. A part of her had wanted to meddle in on the relationship, in order to ensure the two of them ended up together like Marc wanted, but then she had remembered what had happened when she had tried to get them together to write a comic book, and realized maybe that wasn’t the best idea.  
“It’s okay, Marc,” she had said softly. “I won't tell anyone, I promise.” She had begun to walk away, only to turn back and murmur, “And for the record, I hope everything works out well. You know, with you and Nathaniel.”  
Her and Marc hadn’t talked about the exchange since but the knowledge had stayed with Marinette, in the very same place of her heart that held her deepest secrets, like her love for Adrien, and the true identities of Ladybug and Rena Rouge. Knowing Marc’s secret crush had actually made rehearsal even more enjoyable because there were many moments where she would look across the room and see Marc and Nathaniel talking to each other and feel her heart light up with encouragement and satisfaction, but in the end it also succeeded in making every Lady Montague and Montague scene that much worse.   
Suddenly, Marinette lurched back to the present, giggling nervously as she realized that Nathaniel was looking at her expectantly. “Oh? I… Uh,” she glanced around, her cheeks flushing as her mind struggled to regain what the question had been. “Of course I’m excited for the show!” she guessed, only for her eye to catch sight of Alya from across the room. “Well, Alya needs me so I’d better go! Wouldn’t want to disappoint the star!” she began walking past him, then turned back and waved saying, “Nice talking to you Nathanie-oof!”  
Marinette whipped her head around as she collided right into Chloe.   
“Oh my god,” Chloe drawled. “Did you just bump into me? I can’t believe you, Marinette. How did a klutz like you even get into this show?” she finished, then barked her familiar hideous laugh.   
“I auditioned like everyone else, Chloe,” She responded as sweetly as she possibly could, trying not to belt out the fact that she may be a klutz during the school day, but she had also roundhouse kicked villains in the face countless of times, and she could very well do the same to her if she ever said the words ‘Utterly ridiculous’ ever again. Sometimes Marinette found herself wondering if revealing her secret identity would be worth it if she got to kick Chloe Bourgeois in the face. She sighed. Even if that was the way her secret got out, it wouldn’t be today.  
She calmly worked her way around Chloe, and pressed onwards until she was finally at Alya’s side. She nearly screamed as right as she was about to say ‘hi’ to her friend, Ms. Bustier chimed up, announcing that the rehearsal would now be starting. Instead, she simply flashed Alya a smile, murmured ‘Good luck’ and watch her make her way up the stage with Adrien. She tried not to stare at him as he said his lines, but failed. What was even worse was that she also failed in not mouthing along with him. She had studied lines with Alya so frequently that at this point she knew nearly every character’s lines by heart.   
Nino noticed her lip synching and leaned over to whisper, “Do you know all the lines?” She nodded shyly and his eyes widened. “Dude, that’s super impressive.”  
“Thanks Nino,” she said with a smile.   
“Sorry about this scene man,” he continued, his face softening to an empathetic frown. “This must be hard for you to watch.”   
Marinette blinked. “What do you mean? I love Romeo and Juliet.”  
“No, I mean this particular scene,” he said, gesturing to where Adrien had taken Alya’s hand on stage. “I mean watching my girlfriend kiss someone else is hard enough but watching her kiss my best friend…” Nino trailed off and something like a cringe formed on his face, only for him to shake his head and murmur, “I don’t know. I guess based on your crush on my man Adrien that Alya totally didn’t tell me about at all, I thought you might understand a little, is all.”   
Nino had been talking at a low whisper, and yet, him so bluntly talking about her feelings for Adrien still made her heart hammer in her chest. Anxiety clattered in her skull, whispering that surely someone horrible like Chloe or Sabrina had happened to be eavesdropping on the conversation, and would confront her later right in front of Adrien and ruin everything, finally exposing her, sort of like Jagged Stone being in her room on live television, only worse… She bit back a nervous screech and whipped her head around, trying to scout out the nearest people who could have been listening. Fortunately, the only people she saw in ear-shot were Juleka and Rose and they were sitting a few seats down completely immersed in their own whispered conversation, full of giggles, soft smiles, and occasional blushing.   
A part of her wanted to scream at Nino for bringing Adrien up in a public place like that, but once she saw nobody heard and the panic subsided, her anger did as well. Besides, there was something so mind-numbingly sad about the way he had said the word understand…   
She sighed and offered him a small smile. “Yeah. I totally get what you’re saying.”  
“If only you had gotten Juliet,” Nino muttered miserably, putting his head in his hands, only for it to shoot back up again. “I mean- No! I didn’t mean that. You know I didn’t mean that dude. Alya’s amazing, she deserves the role, it’s just…”  
He never got to finish his sentence as Ms. Bustiers voice suddenly rose up above the noise, instructing the scene to stop. Marinette frowned, her mind processing the words Ms. Bustiers was saying, only to leave her more dumbfounded. Apparently Alya was messing up all of her lines, and could hardly get a sentence out. But that didn’t make any sense. Alya never forgot her lines, and even if she did, her and Marinette had went over this exact scene just the other day. Marinette’s thought were cut short as Ms. Bustiers spoke again, the level of panic in her voice so intense it reminded Marinette of the moments before she had been akumatized into Zombizou.  
“I’m so sorry Ayla, but I’m afraid we’re going to need to replace you until you can learn these lines,” Ms. Bustier closed her eyes and Marinette could have sworn she saw a shutter go through her body before she said, “We don’t have time for this! The show is in a week, and we don’t even have an understudy, but Adrien needs to rehearse this scene! Is there anybody who’d be willing to step up here and finish delivering the lines?” she finished desperately.   
Marinette hardly registered what was happening. None of this made any sense. Alya being replaced in one of the most important scenes in the show? Alya had not worked so immensely hard to land the role only to forget her lines on the first day of tech week. Clearly there had been some sort of mistake.   
Suddenly, Marinette saw Chloe’s hand shoot up from the back of the room, followed by her shouting, “I’ll do it! I’ll play Juliet!”  
Ms. Bustier hesitated for a moment before nodding and saying, “Very well, Chloe. You can play Juliet for this scene.”  
Chloe shot up like a rocket, flouncing towards the stage like a runway model. “Finally, the world is running like it should. No more red-headed freaks taking my role away from me. It’s just me and you now Adrikens!” she crooned.  
Everything stopped. No. Marinette had not been through so many weeks of supporting Alya, only for the first rehearsal to include a kiss that wasn’t staged to be acted by Chloe Bourgeois.   
“Wait!” Alya said onstage, and everyone turned towards her, including Chloe, whose eyes were full of disdain. “Pardon me, Ms. Bustier,” she said with a smile. Marinette wasn’t sure whether to admire or be completely disgusted by her calm demeanor when Chloe was about to lock lips with Adrien in front of the entire class. “Not that I have any objection to Chloe playing Juliet, after all, we don’t have an understudy. It’s simply that I wonder whether she actually knows the lines for the scene or not.”  
Marinette blinked. What was Alya up to? And why did this feel like Maylene and Ivan’s movie, only twenty times worse?  
“Well?” asked Ms. Bustier. “Do you know the lines Chloe?”  
Chloe stiffened, casting Alya one of her dirtiest looks yet, which was saying a lot. “What does it matter whether I know the lines?” she snarled. “Adrien and I were meant to be together, onstage and in real life, right Adrihoney?” She smiled at Adrien who looked away awkwardly. Marinette suppressed the urge to either laugh out loud or simply tackle Chloe to the ground in the middle of the hall.   
Ms Bustier sighed. “Alright. Looks like we’re back to square one. If Ms. Bourgeois can’t play the role either than what do you suggest we do?” she asked, the question directed towards Alya.  
“Marinette knows all the lines for this entire scene, I’m sure she could fill in for me. I have complete confidence in her,” Alya said proudly.  
Marinette flung to her feet. “W-What?” she stammered. “You want me to- to- to-”   
Suddenly, it all made sense. Alya had been playing dumb so there would be no choice but to replace her, all the whilst knowing Marinette would make the perfect understudy. Now she had set it up perfectly so that when Romeo kissed Juliet, it would be Marinette who got the privilege of kissing Adrien Agreste, the most perfect boy of all time, far better than any Romeo.  
Alya winked, and before Marinette was able to get another word out, Ms. Bustier was wishing her luck and practically shoving her on stage. Alya plopped down in the chair next to Nino, beaming, but he hardly noticed her, because where he had been distant and casual before, he was now on the edge of his seat, chin resting on his hands, eyes wide as he waited for the big moment. In fact, the entire auditorium was now full of gaping mouths and huge eyes, Rose practically screaming into her hands as she anticipated what was about to happen.   
The only person who didn’t look anything short of ecstatic was Nathaniel, whose face was turned into the subtlest of frowns. Well, Nathaniel and Chloe, who was currently storming her way out of the room, muttering “Ridiculous! Utterly ridiculous!” She approached Sabrina who was standing near the doors, staring at the stage with a giddy expression, only for Chloe to yank her out of the room, muffling her cries of protest with more streams of complaints about how Adrien was ‘all hers’.  
Finally, Marinette reached the top of the stairs and crossed onto the stage, so she was directly in front of Adrien. She gulped and her heart thundered in her throat like a raging stampede of emotions. She wanted to bail out and race out of the room to hang out with Chloe and Sabrina - anything to get her off this stage. Because as much as she had dreamed about this moment, about kissing the legendary Adrien Agreste, now that she was here about to do it… It felt so much more real than a poster of his schedule in her room or the lockscreen on her computer. It felt so much more terrifying.   
She tried to breathe. She tried to remind herself that she was Ladybug. She fought villains and saved Paris almost every other day. She was fearless. She could do anything. So she could at the very least stand here and keep her dignity by staring into the breathtaking eyes of the boy she loved.  
Suddenly, Adrien was reaching out towards her, taking her hands in his, and everything stopped. She stopped breathing, she stopped worrying, all she could do was watch as he smiled at her, and began to say the same old lines that suddenly seemed like something new and exciting to her anticipating ears.  
“If I profane with my unworthiest hand this holy shrine, the gentle sin is this: My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand to smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.”  
Marinette opened her mouth, and expected herself to stutter and make a total fool of herself as she usually did when Adrien was around, but instead the familiar lines slipped out of her mouth easily and softly like silk and pearls dripping off of her tongue like in those obscure fairy tales were gifts were really curses. “Good pilgrim,” she whispered, her voice the soft secret lilt of Juliet, rather than the flustered rant of Marinette. “You do wrong your hand too much, which mannerly devotion shows in this, for saints have hands that pilgrims’ hands do touch, and palm to palm is holy palmers’ kiss.”   
The suggestion in the words felt so horrifically real now that they stood so close and Adrien’s skin was so warm against her palms, reminding her with every passing millisecond that for once this was not a dream.  
“Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?” Adrien asked with a crooked smile and a subtle wink Marinette was pretty sure he hadn’t rehearsed with Alya.  
A blush rose to her cheeks and a pit of melting gold began overflowing in her heart making her whole body light and heavy at the same time. She allowed a quiet laugh to escape her as her answer rumbled out, “Ay, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.”  
“O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do. They pray; grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.”  
“Saints do not move, through grant for prayers’ sake.”  
“Then move not, while my prayers’ effect I take,” Adrien murmured, his voice suddenly so soft she hardly even heard the words, though she knew the line. It was the line right before the first kiss.  
He looked down at her with a small smile and began to lean forward and she couldn't breathe as she raised herself up slowly so that she was on her tiptoes and he was only centimeters away. She couldn’t believe this was happening. It was actually happening. She couldn’t even believe she had remembered the lines, let alone that she had delivered them so flawlessly. This moment seemed achingly similar to back before her and Chat Noir had fought Horrificator, and she had been about to kiss Adrien for the project. She kept replaying that moment in her head over and over, recalling the euphoria, only to be followed by soul-shattering disappointment when she hadn’t ended up kissing her prince charming after all because of Chloe’s interruption.  
Finally, she had raised herself up as far as she could go, and she felt her nose brush across Adrien’s, the will power it took not to scream becoming so intense she could hardly believe it. Her eyes fluttered shut and she kept waiting for something to happen, because surely this was too good to be true. Surely Chloe would shove them apart any second now, because that’s what always happened. Every single time.   
Except this one.   
Suddenly, Marinette’s lips met Adrien’s in a frighteningly perfect first kiss. Every tense muscle in her body loosened upon the impact and a blush so strong it was almost criminal rose to her cheeks. She couldn’t hear anything but the roaring in her head, and all she could think about was the fact that she was finally doing it. Suddenly, her kiss with Chat Noir didn’t matter anymore. That may have been her first kiss, but this was the moment she had been waiting for. She felt Adrien’s hands pull away from hers and for a moment a surge of disappointment flooded her, though his lips were still on hers. Then his hands floated down to her waist, resting there and deepening the kiss. Shock pulsed through her and her breath caught, only for her hands to somehow find their way to his cheek. She could feel the fine lines of his jaw under her palm and her lungs burned and her heart swelled with the unfamiliar but desirable sensation.  
Finally, they pulled away and Adrien was staring at her, and the evergreen of his eyes caught a spark in her heart that threatened to erupt. She nearly said it right then and there. She nearly told him the truth about just how much she cared about him; how he was her first thought when she woke up in the morning, and her last thought when she fell asleep at night.   
She would have if he hadn’t said, his voice ringing out clear as a bell, “Thus from my lips, by thine, my sin is purged.”  
She blinked. Once. Then twice. “I… What?”  
“Cut!” Ms. Bustier cried. Both Marinette and Adrien’s heads swung to the side immediately to face her, and Marinette jerked her hands away from Adrien’s face so that they huddled awkwardly towards the middle of her chest instead. “Wonderful! Truly wonderful! Adrien, the passion in which you delivered the kiss! And you Marinette! Oh it truly was wonderful. Unfortunately, we have many other scenes to run today and Marinette is still in possession of the role Lady Montague, so we must be going on to other scenes. But pravo, children, pravo!” Ms. Bustier finished contentedly.  
Marinette wanted to be upset. She wanted to be disappointed at the harsh realization that though the kiss had been splendid, it had only been acting in the end, and yet, a brilliant smile stayed stubbornly on her face, refusing to go away until her face began to hurt from the force of it. Even then it stayed put. Adrien was staring downwards and at first she was puzzled at the direction of his gaze, until she realized his eyes were locked onto his hands that were still pressed lightly against her hips. His eyes were wider than usual and he blinked at least one too many times before finally sliding his hands away from her and taking a small step backwards. He scratched the back of his head and laughed nervously in that way that made his eyes scrunch up - a look Marinette found herself daydreaming about far too often.  
She wanted to say something to him, she wanted to be filled with that reckless desire to confess her true feelings the way she had been when she had forgotten where they were, and all that had mattered was the fact that he was next to her, but the impulse was gone. The fear had returned and she was once again disabled by the captivating shade of his eyes and the careless effort of his sweetened smile.   
She opened her mouth to at least say something, but nothing came out and the familiar reality of freezing up once again struck her like a blow to the face. Somehow she had expected the kiss to be magic like the one she had given to Chat; maybe she had wanted it to unlock some hidden side of her that could take Adrien by the hand and run off into the sunset with him like she had always longed to do, the two of them laughing all the while. Her shoulders sagged slightly. Of course, it hadn’t worked that way. Because that fearless bold side of her that had the initiative to get the things she wanted was Ladybug. And Ladybug hadn’t been here to kiss Adrien. Marinette had.  
She tried to force down the blush and the smile still parading across her face, but to no avail. Instead she just did the only thing she could do: She began heading down the stairs. She couldn’t resist the urge to turn back to Adrien and wave shyly. Suddenly, her foot hit air, rather than the step it was supposed to, and she was left to tumble down the stairs like a tossed ragdoll. She groaned from her position on the floor, twitching like a cockroach, and a blush of a far different kind rose with red hot fingers up her neck as Alya had to help her up from her grand exit in front of the entire auditorium - including the crush of her dreams that she had just kissed for the first time.  
Kissed… Suddenly, the emptiness inside her where Ladybug should have taken over and the embarrassment of her fall didn’t seem so awful after all. Because she had just kissed Adrien Agreste. Alya was blabbering something excitedly in her ear and clutching her arm so hard she thought it might break, but Marinette hardly heard or felt any of it. Ever so slowly she brought her hand up to her lips, an explosive sort of surprise welcoming her there as she realized they were still tingling.   
She was also still smiling. In fact, through everything that happened that day she couldn't seem to stop that one smile from plaguing her features. Even when Chloe harassed her in the hallway asking her who she thought she was that smile stayed plastered on. Even as she walked home to a pile of so much homework she thought she might drop dead, still the smile persevered. Finally, at the very end of the day when her exhausted body couldn't possible hold up her bliss for all to see anymore, the smile slowly melted away as she slipped into her dreams. But it was still there on the inside. It was still there in spirit. And the one thing she knew with complete certainty, even in a day of so many unanswered questions mixed in with the cataclysmic occurrences, was that she might very well carry around that same smile for the rest of her life. 

 

 

Adrien Agreste walked down the hallway to his first class, exhaustion teasing him from the inside out with every step he took. He hadn’t realized that a singular day of tech week could be so emotionally and physically draining, especially considering the fact that he fought crime and saved Paris nearly every other day. He just hoped Hawkmoth didn’t akumatized anyone for the rest of this week, after all, he had far too much on his plate learning and rehearsing his lines for Romeo. He had become accustomed to balancing Adrien and Chat Noir, but he wasn’t exactly sure he could handle being three different people at once, even if one of them was simply a character for a play that would be over in less than two weeks.   
Adrien had expected to get a part in the show, simply because he had been confident in his audition, but he certainly hadn’t expected to be Romeo himself. In fact, he hadn’t expected any of the things that had happened since then either. He hadn’t expected to have to have his first kiss on stage in front of an audience. Second kiss, he reminded himself. Just because he had been cursed when Ladybug had kissed him before, didn’t mean that it hadn’t happened. Plagg seemed to think that the distinction wasn’t important, but what did he know? All he ever cared about was cheese. He knew nothing about Adrien’s love for Ladybug, or any love for that matter.   
Love…There was another thing he hadn’t expected about this show. He had assumed Chloe would get the role of Juliet, so he had been very shocked to find out it was Alya - as well as extremely relieved. Chloe was a good person at heart, but sometimes she let things go too far, whether it was some nasty joke or her over imaginative fantasies about the two of them being a future couple. That had been his main problem with getting the role of Romeo. He hadn’t wanted his Juliet to get the wrong idea just because they had to kiss on stage. He knew how it felt to have your emotions played with by someone you cared about, and it wasn’t exactly the most enjoyable situation.   
Of course, Ladybug had good intentions, but that didn’t mean that the feeling of her head resting sweetly against his shoulder to distract Glaciator hadn’t hurt in his fragile heart. Maybe that’s why he had never officially rejected Chloe. He didn’t ever want to be the cause of the empty cold feeling that rejection stirred in people’s hearts. Besides, how could he explain to Chloe that he loved another, when the only way for him to be so hopelessly in love with someone like Ladybug was for he himself to be Chat Noir? Maybe Chloe wouldn’t put it together, but her knowing - anybody knowing for that matter - was a risk he couldn't take. Unless, of course, he were to tell Ladybug. He could trust her, he knew he could; it was one of the many things he adored about her.   
In the end, he had been left secretly rejoicing when Alya had been cast as Juliet; because she was with Nino, so there was no way she would make more of the situation than what was actually there, and besides, she was his friend which would make him more comfortable acting around her. At least, he had been secretly rejoicing, until she had started butchering all her lines on the first day of tech week, causing his heart to start beating a million times a minute.   
The rest of that scene had been a roller coaster ride from start to finish. As Chat he had always been able to roll with the punches, but as Adrien he found it slightly harder to keep up. At first he had thought Chloe was going to be allowed the role of the understudy and he had been instantly frustrated, panicked, and yet utterly hopeless, all at the same time. He had thought nothing could make the situation any worse, and then suddenly Alya had mentioned the brilliant point that Chloe didn’t know any of the lines, which meant they were back to not having an adequate Juliet. Much as he despised the idea of kissing Chloe Bourgeois in front of everyone, he had much preferred that to the paralyzing thought of simply not being able to rehearse one of the scenes he was most nervous and unprepared for.   
Suddenly, Alya had mentioned Marinette, and where everything had gone in fast-motion when Chloe had been marching up to the stage like some sort of hellhound come to claim him, the moment Marinette stood up, her eyes wild and face flushed the usual bright red he was beginning to automatically associate with her, everything had swirled into slow-motion. He had never considered the possibility of Marinette Dupain Cheng representing his Juliet. He hadn’t been sure how he felt about it, and even as each step she took up the stairs had felt like millenia in his nervous state, he hadn’t seemed to be able to think straight or even gather his thoughts at all as she had come closer.   
Even so, he hadn’t hesitated for even a moment before taking her hands in his. He had opened his mouth to deliver his line, but it hadn’t come out at first, because he had forgotten how to speak. He had told himself it was simply because he had been caught off guard since he had never performed the scene with Marinette before, but a part of him knew he had taken a few more extra seconds than he should have needed to stare at the small smile that had lit up Marinette’s face as their skin had touched.  
Finally, he had begun his line and like clockwork him and Marinette had fallen into a steady rhythm, working together to deliver the scene, until it had hardly even felt like he was acting anymore. It had even reminded him, if only for a second, of the flawless way that he and Ladybug’s skill sets complimented each other, creating the perfect partnership and allowing them to work like two different segments of a well-oiled machine. He had felt a rush of gratitude for Marinette’s memory and her eagerness to volunteer, because this scene had been giving him trouble for a long time, but with her up there with him, her lines and presence supporting his, everything had suddenly come so naturally he had nearly forgotten he had struggled at all.  
Finally, the moment for the kiss had come, and he could have sworn that everyone in that entire room had been holding their breaths, including Marinette. A small smile had spread to his lips as he had leaned towards her and he hadn’t known exactly why it had been there, only that it had been and he hadn’t been able to get rid of it. Marinette had risen up onto her toes and he had felt their noses touch, which had reminded him instantly of the kiss they had almost shared so long ago before him and Ladybug had fought off Horrificator. A part of him had felt as if this new Romeo and Juliet kiss seemed right, like even though he wasn’t in love with Marinette, the two of them deserved this kiss simply to make up for the one Chloe had prevented. Or something like that…   
He had forgotten how sentences were formed and what the purpose of letters were the instant their lips had touched. The kiss hadn’t been too forced or too timid, but simply the exact right pressure, having filled him with a sensation somewhere in between floating on a cloud and dancing in the rain.   
The rain… He had suddenly been thrown viciously into a sea of memories, starting with the day he had met Marinette. He had remembered given her the umbrella. The light touch of her fingers against his, along with the intoxicating innocence of her smile as her clumsy bad luck had crushed the black material down around her face, had made him laugh for the first time in days. That had also been the day he had met Ladybug. Her fearlessness and bold apparition, complete with her neverending confidence in herself - and in him - had never ceased to save Paris since that fateful day, and it had also never ceased to drive him mad with feelings he could never fully explain.   
And yet, somehow his memories of Marinette blushing in the rain had stood stark against the visions of Ladybug standing strong on the eiffel tower. For a moment, the comparison had caused shame to course through him. After all, he loved Ladybug and he was loyal to her, no matter the cost of rejection and pain. The sudden swarming thoughts of Marinette had taken him aback and caused him to instantly pull away his hands. Then he had just felt silly. Because he loved Ladybug, it was true. But he also loved Marinette. After all, she was his best friend. Maybe it had been his newly fueled appreciation for Marinette or just his self-embarrassment, but something had caused his hands to find Marinette’s waist, resulting in a deeper version of the same kiss.   
When he had pulled away he had felt a ripple of satisfaction coursing through him, but it wasn’t the kind he had anticipated. He had thought he would be proud of his ability to perform the kiss in a believable fashion, but that hadn’t been the feeling stirring in his chest as he had stared into her blue-bell eyes. That had been the final thing he hadn’t expected.   
He hadn’t expected the jolt of contentment that came, not from performing an act, but from kissing the girl of your dreams. - The girl who was supposed to be his Lady, not Marinette. Marinette was his friend. Only his friend. Ladybug was the girl he was in love with. What had scared him far more than those thoughts in his head had been how hard he had been trying to persuade himself of their truth, when they should have been obvious. It was that deep terror that had caused him to say, almost instantaneously “Thus from my lips, by thine, my sin be purged.”   
She had looked so confused and yet dazzled at the same time like he had just given her a gift far better than any hat she had sewn him for christmas, that he had almost wanted to kiss her again just to see that look on her face intensify and last forever. Again…  
Just like that, it had all been over, leaving him to experience the rest of the rehearsal as normal. Now it was the next day and he was beginning to wonder how Alya had managed to remember all of her lines except for the ones in that particular scene. Perhaps she had also been having trouble with that particular part. If only they had ran lines together beforehand, then all the confusion could have been avoided. He chuckled, and told himself he would ask her about it next time he saw her.  
“Waaaaghaaagh!” He heard someone scream and turned around to see Marinette behind him. Her foot must have caught on something and now she was in mid-fall in the middle of the hallway.   
Without thinking, without even breathing, he raced over towards her and caught her elbow, helping to lift her back up before she ever had the chance to hit the ground. She beamed at him as she looked up, “Thank y-” she started, then her eyes widened as she registered it was him. “A-Adrien!” she stammered.   
Adrien couldn’t help but laugh lightly. This was all so typical of Marinette. Then he noticed the blush creeping into her cheeks and he realized with a start that this was the first time he was seeing her since the kiss. His hearty laughter died, only to swiftly be replaced with a nervous titter as his eyes met hers. They were so big and bright, like orbs of moonlit ocean shining there in front of him… He quickly averted his gaze, staring at his shoe and kicking it awkwardly against the ground.  
“So…” he started, having no idea what to say next and still being far too baffled by whatever was going on inside of him to possibly form actual sentences.   
He didn’t understand. He had never been this flustered around Marinette before, and he had established yesterday that he was still in love with Ladybug… Hadn’t he? Yes. Yes, he had. So then why was this feeling so persistent, and why was it still here when it had been so many hours since he had kissed Marinette? He shook his head rapidly. What he had meant was since Romeo had kissed Juliet. He had to stop thinking about the kiss as if it had been a choice - for either of them. The only reason he had kissed her was because he had needed a Juliet and she was the only one who had known the lines.   
He was still desperately in love with Ladybug and nothing in all of Paris could change that, especially not the girl who sat behind him in class with her quiet smile and a heart that was warm and caring, not to mention her brilliant mind and excellent work-ethic, and the way she never failed to stand up for herself and her friends, and her unique nature that made him want to kno- No. He was not in love with Marinette.  
Hopefully, if he said it enough times he might start to believe it.   
“Look, Marinette,” he tried slowly, still avoiding her eyes for fear of what his heart might whisper to him. “I’m really sorry about what happened yesterday.”  
“Yesterday?” Marinette peeped. “D-d-Did something seussical- I mean unusual happen yesterday? I don’t seem to recall…” she muttered with severe over exaggeration, a slight giggle creeping out in the middle of her voice as she spoke the words.   
The small laugh amused Adrien and he found his eyes being drawn to her face, only for them to connect with her eyes. He told himself it shouldn’t matter and that he would be just fine, considering he had no out of the ordinary feelings for Marinette whatsoever.   
“Well, you know, with the hiss and everyth-”   
He froze. Had he just… He wanted to curl up into a ball on the floor until Marinette left. A blush began to seep into his cheeks and for a moment he wished he could just transform into Chat Noir, if only so he’d be able to get through a conversation without panicking like this. At least if Chat had slipped up with the cat pun it would have been purr-ceived as natural and furr-tatious, but right now, Adrien’s mind was clawing for answers and yet it seemed stupid puns were all he could think about. He sighed. He supposed he had made his cat bed and now he needed to curl up in it.  
He nearly screamed.  
Marinette was just staring at him. She blinked twice and he smiled uncomfortably, trying to hide the fact that he was sobbing internally.   
“OH!” Marinette said suddenly, with far too much enthusiasm, and he nearly crumpled to the ground with relief. “You mean the kiss. I mean, no! Not kiss! That’s not what I… Actually wait, that- that is what I meant this time…”   
For a moment both of them just stood there, staring at each other, Marinette with an anxious smile on her face, spreading nearly from ear to ear, accompanied by a slight wheeze, and Adrien scratching his head self-consciously, trying too hard to pull himself together.   
Finally, when he no longer felt like every word that was coming out of his mouth had come straight from the litter box, he continued on, saying, “What I was trying to say is that, obviously that was really awkward, so I apologize for that. I just… Hope it doesn’t ruin our friendship.” Friendship… the word felt empty in a way that it never had before, causing fury to rise up in Adrien’s belly. Maybe it was that same frustration that caused him to add, as if as a horrid afterthought, “It’s not like I wanted to kiss you anyway. It was just acting.”  
Marinette’s eyes widened in a different way than before, and her gaze flicked down, away from his, causing both relief and shame to send shivers down his arms.   
“Oh,” she muttered. “Right. Just acting. F-for me too. Definitely. Of course I’d never want anything to r-ruin our friendship.”   
The way she said the word friendship hit him like a hard blow to the ribs, even though he had said it first. The worst part was, he wasn’t sure if it hurt because she had said it in a way that implied disappointment , or if he had simply imagined that part and it hurt for a different reason - one that had nothing to do with Marinette’s reaction, and everything to do with his own.   
He didn’t want to think about that. He didn’t want to think about anything until he had seen Ladybug again. This morning he had been grateful for the recent lack of akumas, but now he desperately craved for one. Because whatever glitch was happening in his heart, causing him to act so strangely around Marinette, would certainly go away once he met with Ladybug again and was reminded just how much he loved her. Then he would see that Marinette was still just a friend, and then he would never have to worry about kisses, or stuttering awkward sentences, or confusing feelings ever again. At least, not when it came to Marinette. Never when it came to Marinette. She was a good friend, a fantastic friend, and that was the way she was going to stay.  
So Adrien went along with the rest of his day, telling himself he didn’t care about Marinette all the while. He forced himself to ignore the strange feelings blossoming further and further in his chest, feelings that maybe had always been there, but never to such extent, so that he hadn’t seen them until they had taken over, like invasive species, stealing the light away from his precious Lady. He ignored the dull ache he felt as he watched Marinette disappear down the hallway to a class he didn’t have with her, waving shyly as she walked. He ignored the unplanned stab of jealousy he felt as he watched Marinette perform scenes with Nathaniel as his wife when they rehearsed that night. He ignored the passionless experience that was kissing Alya compared to kissing Marinette.   
He ignored all the strange new emotions all the way through tech week, though they still remained fresh, until finally the one moment he had been looking forward to the whole week was finally here. He practically raced home, despite the fact that on a typical day returning to his father’s mansion-disguised-prison was his least favorite activity. But this day was far from a typical day. Because on this final day of tech week he was returning home with a singular complimentary ticket in his pocket to give to his father. He couldn’t remember the last time his father had attended any event of his that wasn’t a photo-shoot - even those he hardly attended anymore- but this time he had hope. In fact, maybe it was simply because he had spent the entire week in such a depressed distant state because of his bafflement about Marinette, but this time he had all the hope in the world…

 

Adrien practically pranced through the front door, only to see the hallways of the mansion empty. He had gotten so used to the empty feeling of being so utterly alone even in his own home, that he had forgotten how it felt to ever expect anything different. He wasn’t entirely sure why he had today. He sighed. This was the reason why Plagg was one of his best friends, other than Marinette, Nino, and Alya of course; because he always stayed right by his side, no matter what.   
And yet, Adrien wasn’t going to give up. Not yet. He began pacing the hallways, looking around anxiously for anyone he could talk to. He couldn’t help but remember what it had been like when his mom was still around. Her and his dad had always been right at the door to greet him when he got home. They would ask him how his day was and drive him to his photo-shoots, and his photographer was always giddy when he showed up, saying he had such a natural smile that just radiated happiness, and that no matter how many photo-shoots he did, he would never get enough of seeing it. He couldn't remember the last time his photographer had been so happy to see him. Now his bodyguard drove him to his photo-shoots, his dad was always gone and his mother… Let’s just say, it had become far harder for him to smile at his photo-shoots since his life had changed.  
Sometimes he forgot he had had such involved parents at all, and then he remembered that his mom had been gone for only about a year and he felt even worse - either from loss or guilt he didn’t know. The household was just so bizarrely different without her, and some days he felt like it had always been his life, while other days he didn’t think he’d ever get used to it.   
He sighed, making his way down, yet another, absurdly long empty hallway. He was just turning the hallway that would lead to his bedroom, finally giving up, when he ran into Nathalie.   
“Oh. Hello Adrien,” she said, looking only slightly more frazzled than usual.   
Nathalie had always baffled Adrien, from the day his father had hired her onwards, because she was so calm and pristine all the time, with her hair neatly pressed and her glasses perfectly placed, and yet, he was sure there was something there under the slick outfit and empty eyes. After all, he had fought enough akumatized villains to know when someone wasn’t quite being their true selves, and Nathalie seemed to have that problem, even though those nasty butterflies had never been near her before. Occasionally he would see a little glimmer of sadness in her eyes, or hear some sympathy in her voice. If she had any actual emotions towards Adrien she never showed them, and if she was ever exasperated or overwhelmed by the tasks his father gave her with such extreme confidence, she never showed that either.   
He supposed he couldn’t really be one to judge, after all his true side hardly ever came out until he transformed to Chat Noir. Only that wasn’t entirely true. He was able to open up around people like Marinette, Nino, and Alya, just not quite as well as he could when he was around Ladybug - although whether it was her personality or his comforting suit and the unrevealing mask that truly unlocked his heart, he wasn’t quite sure.   
Nathalie frowned, looking down at her clipboard. “I didn’t realize you had gotten home.” Her frown deepened and she flipped through her mess of papers, mumbling to herself. “I thought you didn’t get home until six o’clock today.”  
“Actually, the rehearsal ended a little early, so I decided to save The Gorilla the drive and walk home,” he said carefully. He never knew what was acceptable to say around Nathalie. She may not have been very close with him, but every time she frowned in that deep way it instantly set off alarms in his head to tread carefully. He had never seen Nathalie upset before, and he didn’t want to know what it looked like; he had enough to deal with as Chat Noir already, he definitely didn’t need Hawkmoth to akumatize someone like Nathalie.  
Nathalie blinked, finally looking away from the clipboard and back up at him, and for a second he thought she was upset, only to smile warily. “Thank you, Adrien. That was very considerate of you.”  
Adrien wasn’t sure how to react to the compliment. Nathalie was in the awkward position between an acquaintance that you would shake hands with and a mother whom you would hug graciously. Instead of pondering over the notion, he simply nodded and was done.   
Suddenly, he remembered the tickets in his hand, and a certain excitement he hardly ever got at home anymore flared up within him. He held them up slightly more shyly than he had intended and said, “I got this ticket. It’s for my dad. I was going to take it to him, is he in his office?”  
Nathalie’s eyes narrowed as she looked at the ticket, than her eyes softened in the familiar way that always meant bad news.   
“I’m so sorry Adrien, but your father has instructed me to tell you that he won't be attended your play. He sends his sincerest apologies.”  
Adrien’s heart stopped. He couldn’t believe this. Actually, no. He could most definitely believe it. In fact, it was all so irkingly typical. How had he not seen this coming? The coy smile on his face dribbled down into an annoyed frown with the news, his mind revolting against the predictability of the situation, even though he knew it was all too true.   
Suddenly, the words Nathalie had spoken hit him again as if once hadn’t been enough. “Sincerest apologies?” He asked, then scoffed lightly. “Oh sure. If they really were sincere he would have at least told me himself!”  
“Adrien, please. You must understand your father is a very busy man.”  
“Oh yes, very busy, I’m sure. Is that an excuse to miss his son’s entire life? I’m playing the lead!” he added. Then, not sure why he repeated it, continued, saying, “I’m playing the lead and my own family isn’t even going to the show!”  
Nathalie opened her mouth, then closed it again. He was about to ask her what that was all about, when she shakily reached into her front pockets and pulled up a slightly rumpled ticket, her movements sloppy and awkward but her eyes clear and pleading. “I… I purchased a ticket Adrien.”  
Everything was moving too fast and too slow at the same time. Nathalie had purchased a ticket? A part of him wanted to be excited that she had even considered it, a part of him suddenly missed his mother so much it hurt in a way he could never have possible explained, and a final part of him… That final part was angry.   
He was angry at Alya for not knowing her lines. He was angry at Marinette for sparking such confusing feelings inside of him. He was angry at Hawkmoth for not giving him some opportunity to talk to Ladybug. He was angry at Ladybug for refusing to compare identities. He was angry at his father for not being a part of his life, unless it had something to do with fashion design. But most of all he was angry at himself.   
He was angry at himself for being so relieved when Alya had gotten the role, because then he wouldn’t have to tell Chloe how he truly felt. He was angry at himself for refusing to face the feelings he was beginning to have towards Marinette. He was angry at himself for wishing for a new villain just because he was confused. He was angry at himself for not having already detransformed in front of Ladybug already, no matter what she thought was best for them and Paris. And he was angry at himself for the hatred of his own father that sat within him, festering.  
Festering… His whole world was festering because he never did anything about the things that bothered him. That’s where all this self-anger came from. His inability to stand up for himself. Chat Noir was brave and bold, never ceasing to do what was right and chase after the things he wanted, but the boy underneath the mask... Poor innocent little Adrien Agreste was nothing but a coward.   
A coward… Yes, he was useless behind the mask. He couldn’t tell Chloe he didn’t care for her as anything more than a friend because he was too scared of how she might react. He couldn’t face his own desire for Marinette because he was terrified he would ruin everything if he so much as held her hand. He’d rather fight a villain than be at a lack of certainty like the one that had presented itself about Marinette and Ladybug and who he loved.   
He hadn’t shown Ladybug who he truly was because… Because he couldn’t. Not because she had told him not to. Of course, he wanted to obey her and he trusted her decisions, but she was far from the thing holding him back. If he had wanted to know who she was he would have simply opened the door so long ago when they had been facing Lady Wifi. He could have simply opened his eyes when they had been trapped by Dark Owl. But there had always been something holding him back. And that something was fear. He was terrified that whoever Ladybug was didn’t love him; that she wouldn’t love Adrien anymore than she loved Chat, and that the girl under the mask would feel no differently when it was all said and done. To be rejected by Ladybug now was one thing because they could still be friends, but if their identities were revealed and she still didn’t feel anything for him, then it was over, wasn’t it?   
Of course, Marinette, and Ladybug were not the only two people keeping him endlessly spinning around on a carousel of his own cowardice. His father had once been kind and soft-spoken with a delicate smile and an even lighter laugh, but now he was all hard lines and intimidation. Adrien didn’t know how to act around him anymore, let alone how to stand up to him. His father had been keeping in the dark for so long, in fact, he hadn’t even had an idea how to begin asking to go to a public school. He was surprised his stubborn father had ever changed his mind at all.   
The one time he had actually ever stood up to his father was, of course, as Chat Noir, and it wasn’t like it accomplished anything anyway, considering that his father knew nothing about his alternate identity. To be honest, it was tiring keeping it a secret from everyone. The only person who knew was Plagg, and he hardly counted considering he was a kwami, and was in on the action anyway. The first day Adrien had gotten his powers he had immediately wanted to tell his mother, only to realize that wasn’t exactly possible. He had thought about telling his dad, but that had been impossible for a completely different reason - one that had nothing to do with the level of seriousness surrounding keeping their identities.  
Ever since his mother had been taking out of the equation, talking to his father had seemed like some sort of insurmountable task. He craved for even the slightest interaction with his dad, even if it wasn’t positive, as it typically wasn’t. So telling him about Chat Noir? The idea was ridiculous. His father hadn’t even wanted him to go to public school because he claimed it was too dangerous, there was absolutely no way he would allow him to continue being Chat Noir.   
The bitter irony there was tremendous. Because Gabriel Agreste would think he was doing what was best for his son by taking the ring away, but what he wouldn’t ever think to ask was how Adrien felt. He wouldn’t even understand that by ‘protecting’ his son, he was actually taking away everything from him. Because without Chat Noir he hardly had anything left. Chat Noir gave him courage and confidence. Chat Noir was the smile on his face when there were tears in his eyes. Chat Noir was tying his heart together every step of the way, and when he put on that costume he couldn’t be happier.  
But right here, right now, staring at Nathalie with exasperation, he couldn't transform. He could do nothing. For as much as he had always wanted to stand up to his absent father, he would never be able to do so. He’d have to do it through Nathalie.  
Maybe it was the desperation for his suit, maybe it was the way his mind was so horridly turned around because of Marinette, but before Adrien could think twice about it, words were leaking out of his mouth like toxic gasses, “Why did you by a ticket?” he hissed.  
Nathalie opened her mouth to respond, only to seem to notice the emphasis he had put on the word you, causing her mouth to close slowly, with a slight tremble of the lip that the fury rising up in Adrien didn’t register until it was too late.  
“Did my father put you up to this? He thought that if my butler where to go to the show it would make up for everything? Well, he was wrong. I don’t want you there. I want my father…” He trailed off suddenly realizing how upset Nathalie seemed to be. He should stop. Just because he was dealing with some issues in his life gave him no reason to take it out on Nathalie. And yet, the anger in him only seemed to grow the more and more he thought about his father…   
Nathalie took a deep breath as if she was pulling herself together, and whispered quietly, “I’m sorry, I just thought maybe… Maybe you would want me there, because- b-because your mother ca-”  
The mention of his mother was like salt to the wound. He had already been fragile going into this conversation, but that simple word was the equivalent of Nathalie taking his heart and chucking it across the room, shattering it into a million tiny pieces.  
“My mother?” he repeated, his voice full of a lethal quiet he hadn’t known himself capable of. The mention of her should have reminded him to be kind and compassionate as she always had been but instead it just spread more pain, like gasoline to a fire. “You thought you were going to show up as a replacement for my mother? News flash, Nathalie, you are not my mother!’  
He regretted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth. He may not have had an extreme emotional connection to Nathalie, but she was far more than just a butler to him. She may not be a replacement for his mother, but in all honesty, she was the closest he had to her at the moment. Treating her this way…  
“I… I’m so sorry Nathalie, that came out wrong…” he attempted but Nathalie had already turned away.   
He could have sworn he heard her sniffle and a flash of guilt hit him hard like a slap to the face. “Very well, Adrien. I understand. I guess I won't be attending your play after all. I’ll make sure to erase it from the calendar.”  
She had already placed it on the calendar, when all his father had ever done for him was deny him and refuse to acknowledge any of his successes. His heart hurt. He tried to reach out to Nathalie to stop her but she was already rounding the corner, having walked off faster than usual. He sighed, and after a few moments of standing there, hoping she would come back, he finally gave up and headed into his room.  
He looked around at all the fancy things around him that any other teenager would long for: His rock climbing wall, his foosball table, his basketball hoop, his skating rink, his video games, and all the books he could ever want… Looking at the items only made him feel more empty inside. After all, what use were any of these things when he didn’t have a family to share them with? He flopped down on his couch and turned on the TV and Plagg came out of hiding to join him, prattling on about cheese, causing him to laugh quietly. He tried not to think about the fact that other than his kwami friend, the only other person in this household who had ever treated him like family may have been the exact same person he had just turned away…

 

Gabriel Agreste had never been so impatient in his entire life. He had attempted to akumatize another villain so many times over the past week or two that he could hardly count them all, but it seemed there was always positive energy circling its way through the city whenever his evil butterflies tried to make their grand entrance into the weak hearts of their victims. He hadn’t actually been able to evilize someone effectively since he had turned Ms. Mendeliev into The Chalkmaster, but she hadn’t even got close to either Chat Noir or Ladybug’s miraculous, so he hardly counted it. With each failed attempt at akumatization he had grown more and more eager for the next villain. Somehow he could feel it: The next one would finally do it, and he would finally be able to use his wish to get the one thing he wanted above all…  
Earlier that day he had had the chance to akumatize someone, but he had chosen not to. He hated thinking about it that way, though. It was more like he had just casually ignored the obvious negative feelings he had been sensing. At first, he had been ecstatic for the change in the atmosphere, only to see that he recognized the girl that had been generating the negative emotions. He had been prepared to strike anyway, after all, an extremely large number of akumatized villains had originated from Adrien’s classmates, and yet, there had been something different about this time. Because he had watched the scene play out, shocked to see that his son was the one causing the negativity in the girl - Marinette, was her name.   
The two of them had been talking about a kiss of some kind. He had immediately grown angry at the mention of an action so intimate. Adrien was too young to be dating anyone. He wasn’t even in high school yet. Or was he….? Suddenly, Gabriel hadn’t been so sure. A kind of embarrassment he hadn’t felt in a long time had flooded into him, making his heart ache, and he had forced his attention back onto the scene, watching it play out.   
He saw the way Marinette had been looking at his son, and he saw the disappointment and hurt in her eyes - he felt it- as Adrien had mumbled something about not having wanted to kiss her anyway. Instinctively, Gabriel had cringed at the response. For an attractive model who was famous all throughout Paris, his son had a distinct lack of grace when it came to talking to girls. Then Gabriel had remembered his first conversation with Emilie, and his mind had shut up real quick. Maybe that’s why it had stung so badly when he had watched Adrien walk away, leaving Marinette to sniffle quietly, clearly heartbroken over the awkward conversation.  
His akuma had been prepared, ready to fly off and evilize the poor girl, when he had grimly turned it back. Nooroo had been confused but he had just snapped at him, not wanting to have to explain his weakness for his son. Sometimes the days passed so slowly he felt like he would never see the sun rise again, and he began to mourn for all the time he had lost with his son in just the span of a year. Sometimes he realized that he hardly even knew anything about him anymore, except that he wasn’t Chat Noir, and that he was possibly the only person in this entire city that Hawkmoth would never akumatize - Well, he had been anyway. Until Marinette had come along.   
Maybe once he got Ladybug and Chat Noir’s miraculous and could finally free Nooroo forever, he would be able to truly patch the family back together. Yes, the wish he would make to alter reality would make up for all the rules he had set, all the moments he had missed, and all the details he would never understand… Wouldn’t it?   
Gabriel shook his head, flashing himself back fully to the present. He couldn’t let himself start doubting anything now. Not when he could feel victory so very close in his grasp. And yet, hadn’t he had this same feeling dozens of times before? Hadn’t his heart cackled with satisfaction when cursed Chat Noir had almost removed Ladybug’s earrings when under Dark Cupid’s control? Hadn’t he grinned with delight when Troublemaker had actually succeeded in obtaining one of the three of those small pieces of jewelry that meant everything to him? Hadn’t his heart leaped in his throat when he had been holding Dark Owl’s decoy miraculous within his palm, finally believing the day had come at last? And yet, here he stood, no miraculous, and no wish granted, and the only family he had left was left without a father. He shook the feeling off because it scared him more than he wanted to admit.   
And so he stood, trapped in his own fear, the Hawkmoth costume suddenly feeling itchy and odd against his skin like it had never belonged to him. He couldn’t help but wonder if maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad thing after all… He sighed, his eyes slamming shut to block the tears threatening to overflow, as he leaned against his cane, suddenly feeling like an exasperated old man, rather than an esteemed super-villain who wreaked havoc upon Paris.   
Suddenly, he remembered a key component in Marinette and Adrien’s conversation earlier. He had claimed the kiss had been purely acting. Why had he been acting? Gabriel’s mind strained, trying to reveal some detail he was clearly missing. He briefly remembered Nathalie telling him something about a show. Yes, a show. Adrien was going to be in a show.   
A small smile twitched to Gabriel’s face. Emilie had always been a thespian, craving any chance she could to get on stage and perform. Every time she had gotten under a stage light a certain spark had lit up in her eyes that had shattered him to pieces on the floor. He had always been more of a crew person, fascinated by the way theatre worked like clockwork, and of course, instantly drawn to the costumes area of crew. It had been the only extracurricular that had ever really given him a chance to shine. Besides, it certainly hadn’t been an issue that he could spend the down time trying to impress a certain actress dressed in an elaborate costume of feathers that had made her look even more radiant…   
Once he had gotten famous off of his designs he had convinced her to audition for a movie. He had been willing to pull a few strings in order to land her the role, but of course she had earned the part without her last name even coming into context. For a while that had been his favorite movie. Now he couldn’t watch it without pain seizing his heart hard and fast. And yet… He had watched it with Adrien. He had put himself through the pain of the memories, and in all honesty, it had made him feel better. It had made him feel a lot better…  
His smile grew steadily, until he was heading to the door. He was done. He was going to put off his duties as Hawkmoth for a while, at least until the show was over, and he was going to spend some time with his son. “Nooroo, dark wings-”  
Suddenly, his window contraption began to shift, and he turned around instinctively. He began to feel such strong negative emotions radiating through the glass, he thought he may fall to his knees with the force of it.   
“What desperation only to lead to utter disappointment,” he muttered to himself, awe-stricken. “A rejection of a different kind… A loss so prominent it hardly seems real, and yet, it was caused by words alone…”  
Suddenly, he caught view of who this unfortunate circumstance dealt with, only to see Adrien once again, causing guilt to plunge into his heart. He was so easily distracted. Anyway, it didn’t matter now, for he refused to akumatize his own son. He had already akumatized himself, but Adrien would forever be protected from his evilizing spell. It was almost as if some part of him was convinced that if he allowed no akumas to go near Adrien, then any negative feelings he had would go away. And yet, that hadn’t seemed to be working out very well. After all, he sensed Adrien’s raw emotions more than anyone else in the city, he just always ignored them, justifying the fact that once he got the miraculous everything would be back to the way it was before. No… Everything would be better.   
Better… The word rang out in his head, clear as a bell, and longing clung to his heart instantaneously as he imagined the wonderful life he would construct once his wish was fulfilled. But instead he was left with this gaping absence, getting worse and worse by the day. Hawkmoth was supposed to be the solution. Hawkmoth was his salvation… He tried to force the thought away, until suddenly he realized that the strong emotions had not been coming from his son at all. His curiosity successfully peaked, he turned his attention towards the real transmittor - Nathalie.   
He had never akumatized Nathalie before. The thought had not once crossed his mind. He didn’t see any reason not to, however, considering that he had already akumatized both himself and Adrien’s bodyguard. His butler was hardly any more dangerous than those two outcomes.   
He wanted to go back downstairs. He wanted to detransform and go spend time with his son without having to worry about villains, or kwamis, or akumas, or anything at all, for that matter. But there was this persistent itch in his heart, telling him that that wasn’t an option. Never before had he felt such strong emotions, and he couldn't help but feel as if perhaps this really could be the one. Besides, what could possibly be the harm of akumatizing one more villain? If his son were ever really in mortal danger, clearly he would intercede, but despite the rampant emotions within Nathalie at the moment, he knew she would never harm his child; after all, she had been hired to do the exact opposite.   
So with a deep sigh, he opened his palm up and a white butterfly flew obediently onto his glove. He wrapped his other hand around the creature, creating a sort of cocoon, only rather than a caterpillar being turned into a butterfly, he was turning the latter into one of destruction and chaos. Sometimes he wondered what things would be like if he used his powers the way it had been intended and created heroes, other times he was left completely and utterly astonished at the capability of such a small little creature to inflict such damage just by harrowing in on one specific moment of angst and heartache. Today was one of the astonished times.   
He let the creature go and watched as it flew into the air, it’s satiny black wings gleaming as it flew into the light, and out of his layer, into the sky beyond. How funny to think that it would simply be making an awkward loop back into the same house.   
“Fly away my little akuma, and evilize her!” He said with pride and a tad bit of excitement as he watched his creation flutter determinedly out the window.  
He did so hope that sweet Nathalie would understand his decision, and would forgive him shortly. Who knew, maybe this would be a good way for her to get out some of the pent up despair she had wrapped up in her heart. Maybe, after this was all said and done, it would lead to a more efficient butler. He could only hope.  
Once the akuma had manifested itself within some object or another, he felt the connection instantly like a telephone wire had been hooked up between him and Nathalie, and turned on in that one second, causing sparks to ignite.   
He knew in an instant what her new super-villain name would be. For suddenly he remembered that the show Adrien was performing in was Romeo and Juliet; a show Emilie had been in before, if he did recall correctly. His mind struggled to remember exactly what character she had played… Suddenly, it hit him, and the name came tumbling out in response,  
“Lady Mourntague,” he crooned. “I, Hawkmoth, will give you the power to show others the people in their life that they have lost, or are distant from. This way they will never take anything, including you, for granted ever again. In exchange-”  
“I will bring you Ladybug and Chat Noir’s miraculous,” she finished, and he blinked with shock before remembering that this was Nathalie and she knew of his position as Hawkmoth. She also knew what he wanted and what he needed to obtain it. At this point there wasn’t much that Nathalie didn’t know. He cursed himself for being so open about everything with her. After all, even just one person knowing a secret identity could be destructive… Then again, Nathalie wasn’t the type of person to go around blurting secrets. He trusted her. However, it still made him angry that he had allowed her to know in the first place. He wondered if that anger had anything to do with the fact that he trusted her so effortlessly.  
“Yes,” he murmured, equal parts annoyance and pride in his voice. “Now go Lady Mourntague, and remember, get me those miraculous no matter what!”  
“I’m at your command,” she responded, and the double-meaning hit him like a slap to the face with it’s cleverness.   
Nathalie was clever… He could only hope that meant that she wouldn’t let him down. Those miraculous were more important than anything right now, because, as with most of the important business he saw to, it was all, in some way or another, for his son.

 

Marinette had been taking the same way home for the past three years, but for some reason today the walk had seemed to take centuries longer. Alya had offered to walk with her, but this time she had just wanted to be alone. She had tried not to think too long or hard on anything dealing with Adrien, until she was safe within her own pink sequin bedroom, after all, she was in desperate need of Tikki’s legendary counseling, and if she was going to cry, she’d rather it not be in public.  
But once she had entered her room, no tears fell out of her eyes. Instead the hole that had been swallowing up her chest just widened suddenly until it nearly hurt, and she let out a loud groan, flopping down headfirst on the bed. An abrupt but extreme scream split out of her lips, as her nose dug into her patterned sheets, her eyes squeezing shut so tight she began to see dots behind her eyelids. She was aware of her bag popping open at her side, but refused to acknowledge Tikki as she floated cautiously to her side.   
“M-Marinnete?” she heard her kwami stutter.  
“No!” she whined, her voice satisfyingly muffled by the bedspread.   
“I don’t think Adrien meant it like that Mari…”  
Marinette frowned, suddenly shooting up into a seated position, so that a sheepishly sympathetic Tikki was only a few inches away from her increasingly red face.   
“He said he didn’t want to kiss me! What else could he have meant!” she shot back and it was supposed to be aggressive and unreasonable but her voice just sounded small and uncertain.   
“Maybe he was just embarrassed. It’s not every day a boy gets to kiss someone as amazing as you Marinette,” Tikki said and the fact that her words made any sense at all just made Marinette angry. She didn’t want to have any false hope. Adrien had basically looked her in the eyes and told her he didn’t and never had had feelings for her. She’d have to be stupid not to take that serious of a hint. She’d have to be nearly as dull as Chloe to even have a chance at chasing after him now… Chloe…  
She felt like she might throw up. Luckily rather than vomit creeping its way out of her mouth, a wail took its place. Before she knew it she was lunging across the bed and grabbing a pink fluffy pillow within her fingers harshly. She jerked back upwards so that she was in an awkward half-sitting, half laying-down position, and began swatting absurdly at Tikki, trying to bat her out of the air like an ill-conceived baseball player.   
“Marinette!” Tikki scolded, zooming out of the way of the dangerous fluffy weapon.   
Marinette lowered her pillow, a childish pout coming to her lips. Then her eyes trailed downwards to the satiny mound in her lap, and she lowered her head in shame. What was she doing? How could she be getting so worked up over a boy who had no interest in her? God, she really was turning into Chloe. Next thing she knew her hair would be growing out blonde and Tikki would have to fondly explain to her that blue eyeshadow was a curse to all mankind and no respectable Ladybug would ever wear it on a day to day basis. That thought brought a small chuckle to her throat, and before she knew it she was howling with laughter.  
“Are you okay?” Tikki asked slowly, and Marinette rubbed her hands across her face, wiping away phantom tears and pulling herself back together.  
“I’m fine,” she said, forcing a smile to her lips that felt so wrong it was no wonder that Tikki saw through it.   
“You need to stop being so hard on yourself, Marinette,” Tikki muttered. It was incredible how such a high squeaky voice could be so instantly stern when giving advice. “Maybe Adrien really isn’t interested in you, but if not then that’s not your fault. Besides, this could all be one big misunderstanding so the last thing you want to do is freak out about it.”  
Sometimes she hated having Tikki around in times of crisis, just because her sweet kwami always knew exactly what to say, and when Marinette was upset exactly what she wanted to hear was always the last thing she wanted to hear. She wondered why it worked like that. She sighed, finally giving in, and whispering, “You’re right.”  
She got up slowly, crossing over to her desk where she calmly clicked her computer on. “You’re right,” she said again, desperately trying to convince herself that it was true as she stared into the eyes of one of the many Adrien’s on her homescreen. She frowned, then laughed lightly. “I guess this really did get a little out of hand, didn’t it?” She said, gesturing to the Adrien wallpaper.   
She clicked a few times until she was successfully on the personalization page that allowed her to change her wallpaper. She stared at it mournfully, not wanting to commit to something that felt so earth-shaking to her fragile heart. She opened another screen and began searching for alternate wallpapers, but every letter she tried to type made more and more Adrien Agreste options come up. She felt a blush rising to her cheeks even though there was nobody in the room other than Tikki. Her hands shook a little with the force of her embarrassment, only for her to accidentally click down on an option that read ‘Adrien Agreste Photo Shoots.’   
“Abahgh,” she cried out, slamming down on the back button at the top of the page rapidly, until it finally switched back. She breathed a sigh and nearly collapsed with relief into her chair, only for the screen to keep going backwards into her recent history. She saw a page of images under the heading ‘Adrien Agreste’, only for it to flicker backwards to a page entitled ‘Adrien Agreste Fan-Page’. A splash of panic hit her and she giggled nervously, telling herself over and over again that it wasn’t creepy to follow a fan-page just so long as she didn’t make one. Finally, the screen settled on a video called ‘Adrien the Fragrance.’ A blush rose to her cheeks and she looked around self-consciously as if someone had possibly entered her room in the five minutes since she had been on the bed. Quickly, as if she wouldn’t register what she was doing if she did it fast enough, she pressed the play button and watched as the familiar commercial played out before her.   
She screamed as the tinkling music began booming out of her computer at full volume. She had forgotten her and Alya had invited some girls over for a sleepover the other night and had mistakenly given Rose control over the music volume, waking up her parents from all the way downstairs. Rose had apologized about seventy times in ten minutes before Juleka had pulled her aside and talked to her in a low voice, reassuring her that everything was going to be fine. But I guess even despite Juleka’s pep-talk nobody had ever actually turned the volume down after pressing pause.  
“RADIANT!!!” The computer screamed and Marinette clicked on the volume button but it was jammed. She let out a pained nervous squeak as the commercial continued to drone on and the TV Adrien climbed higher and higher through the air.  
“CARE-FREE!!!”   
“No! Nonononononono…” Marinette mumbled stabbing the volume button repeatedly, but to no avail.  
“DREAMY!!!”   
Marinette screamed again, and slammed her face on the keyboard in one last sickening attempt. Whatever she had done must have worked because suddenly the words stopped. She muttered a swift thanks to the ancient Ladybug’s of the past for putting her out of her misery, only to look up to see she had accidentally paused it at the exact moment where Adrien’s face was ultra zoomed in on by the camera.   
An irritating blush rose to her cheeks and she attempted to kick off the ground to send her spinning chair across the room, only for the chair to tilt, resulting in a fumble to the ground instead. She scowled, scrambling her way back into the seat, only to see something other than Adrien’s face staring back at her on her computer screen. It was a text from Alya.  
Girl this is insane! Quick check the Ladyblog! It read.   
Marinette frowned. Most of the time whenever there was an alert on the Ladyblog, Marinette couldn’t look at it because she was busy, well, being Ladybug. She quickly typed in the website to Alya’s blog in the search bar, delighted for the distraction from Adrien and his stupid commercial. So stupid… She thought, ignoring the whimsical feeling still dancing around in her mind. The Ladyblog popped up and Marinette was instantly swarmed with all the different scenes glaring back at her. They were all clips of news recordings that were being broadcasted. Marinette frantically clicked on the first one, panic seizing her hard as the words began to register in her mind.  
“This just in,” Nadja reported calmly. “There’s a new villain in Paris for the first time in a long while. An akumatized citizen calling herself ‘Lady Mourntague’ is now terrorizing young Adrien in Agreste Mansion. Neither Chat Noir nor Ladybug has yet to arrive at the scene. We can only hope that they show up soon! This has been Nadja Chamack reporting your daily news. Don’t be bemused, it’s just the news!”  
Marinette blinked. An akumatized villain? In Agreste mansion? She shot up from the chair barely noticing the texts flooding in from Alya, saying:  
Where in the world is Ladybug?  
Do you think if we go to Agreste Mansion right now, Ladybug will finally do an interview for me?  
……  
Marinette?  
MARINETTE!?  
She typed a quick half-hearted response saying Gtg, before searching around for Tikki. Her ever-loyal kwami was one step ahead of her, already by her side.  
“This will be good for you Marinette. Ladybug has always helped you get your confidence back.”  
Marinette smiled. “You’re right,” she said, and this time she sensed that she meant it more than she had before. Before she could focus on that fact any longer, she uttered the legendary words, familiar to her now as the lyrics to her favorite Jagged Stone song: “Tikki, spots on!”

 

Adrien had been sitting calmly in his room, watching his TV with Plagg slouched against the pillow next to him, only for the door to his bedroom to burst open. He had been immediately on his feet - call it cat-like reflexes- and had whipped around to see Nathalie standing there in the doorway, clipboard in hand. Only it hadn’t been Nathalie at all.   
She had been dressed in an old victorian style gown that looked like a more professional version of the costumes that they had to wear for Romeo and Juliet, only the skirts cut off at her knees instead, revealing black leggings with ominous gray streaks zagging up them. She wore deep ebony stilettos, which was an odd look on Nathalie’s slim already tall frame. There was a veil pulled back over her typical bun that was shredded in odd places giving it an eerie vibe, and the entirety of the costume was pitch black, giving it an essence more appropriate for a funeral than a Shakespearean performance. Her usually pale skin had turned to an ashen gray and her sad eyes had been lined with outrageous amounts of eye-liner, turning her already angular face into a sharp intimidating interpretation. In her hand she held a staff made out of a lean metal pole with her clipboard serving as the pendant at the top of the scepter.   
“Adrien, shouldn’t you be rehearsing your lines?” she had sneered, and now they were here, him frantically looking around for some cover where he could transform to fight the ghastly akumatized villain before him. Only a few seconds later she wasn’t so ghastly after all.   
She waved her clipboard scepter in front of her, a smile cracking to her lips as a dim sparkle fell over her. He blinked and then suddenly there was a different person standing before him. Rather than akumatized Nathalie’s dark hair and slim blue eyes, this person had shimmering blonde hair like sunlight flung fondly across one shoulder and green eyes that were a perfect mirror image of his own. Her face was sweet and heart- shaped with round cheeks, a firm chin, and soft subtle lips quirked into a special kind of smile- one that spoke of contentment to its finest degree.   
All thoughts of becoming Chat Noir faded out of Adrien’s head like they had been a simple phony phantom all along, never to be taken serious. The very existence of Chat Noir suddenly seemed vague and hard to prove, despite the ring on his finger. For Adrien had never even heard of Chat Noir before his mother went missing, and it was his mother that stood before him now, all caring smiles and gentle looks. Something inside of him snapped and his shoulders sagged with the force of it, his eyes no doubt carrying the brutal eclipse of fantasy and reality, as it flickered before him.  
He knew it wasn’t real. Knew it was simply the villain’s power being put into a passionate display, and yet, why think about it like that? Adrien had been let down time and time again by so many people. He had lost his mother, which, somewhere along the road had made him lose his father as well. He had turned Nathalie away and forced her to become this and a part of him feared he had lost Marinette today as well. He had never truly had possession of Ladybug’s heart, at least not in the intricate romantic way he longed for so deeply, and one of the only people he had ever been friends with was a girl who loved him and he couldn’t find a way to break it to her that he didn’t return the feelings. His life was a mess that he couldn't possibly untangle, every line blurring, and every sentence reeling, and yet this was crystal clear.  
This villain was giving him a chance to see his mother again, so was she really a villain at all?  
“Mom?” he choked out, and without a word she opened up her arms to him the way she used to do when he was little.   
He remembered how she used to get down on her knees and he would come running up to her, then when he got there she would swoop him up in her arms and spin him around. He had always loved it because he had felt like he was flying, and in one perfect moment he had been positive he could see all of Paris beneath him. Of course, now, as Chat Noir, he actually had been high enough to see all of Paris once. Ladybug had been there at his side, the wind had been in his hair, the sun shining on his face, and yet, he had known even then that not even the incredible view could have truly lived up to those simple days in his past where he had first seen the city with his mother, without ever even having to leave the Agreste Mansion. Oh how he missed when everything had been straight-forward and serene from the moment he awoke to the moment he went to sleep. He would give anything to get that kind of innocence back. Anything.  
He began to stumble forward subconsciously, arms outstretched and a smile on his face. He briefly registered how strange it was that this time, rather than an akumatized villain coming to him, the situation was flipped. He found it hard to care though as he stared and stared at the sunshine hair and vivid emerald eyes of the woman before him, slowly finding it harder and harder to believe that Nathalie had ever been hired or that his mother had ever been gone at all.   
Suddenly, he was only a foot or two away from his mother, the two of them about to embrace, when he felt something wrap around his waist. The radiant smile dissipated from his face and he looked down to see a black cord wound tightly around his middle. It wasn’t until he saw it that his ears cataloged the scream that had sounded from behind him. But the sound hadn’t been one of fear, but rather one of warning. He wondered why someone would want to warn him away from his own mother.   
He blinked, time slowing down into an awkward sluggish gate that took a severe toll on his mind. Suddenly, before he could truly understand what was happening, his mother’s bright easy-going smile gradually fell into a simmering jeer, and her features began to alter in a grotesque fashion, her curved stout cheeks becoming hard and flat, and her pointed chin shifting to a more delightful round angle. He gasped, his memory finally catching on to the fact that this woman was not his mother at all, but an akumatized version of his butler Nathalie. Nathalie… A severe sadness latched onto his heart, his reincarnated loneliness contributing an additional ache. His mother was gone. He had no one. No one but a few close friends and Plagg.   
Plagg. Suddenly the realization that he still needed to transform and that Ladybug would need his help hit him, only to remind him of the cord around his waist. Just like that, everything sped up into normal time once more, and before he could even pull away from the villain he faced, he was being tugged backwards. He let out a surprised yelp as he was flung half-way across the room, Ladybug’s yo-yo pressing hard into the small of his back as he slammed into something. Or someone.   
He felt his body clatter to the ground, his ears thrumming with the need to say those three simple words that would alter his state into someone who was actually prepared for this battle. He squirmed, Ladybug’s string still wrapped firmly around his waist as he tried to position himself so that he could push off the ground and back up to his feet. He froze as he realized that when he had slammed into Ladybug on his way back he had taken her down to the ground with him, and he now lay on top of her, his face only mere inches away from hers. Suddenly three very different, far more dangerous words flooded into his head, making his heart pound.  
He tried to remind himself of the pressing need to transform, but all his thoughts had dried up inside his head. He swallowed, butterflies flapping their wings unnecessarily rapidly within his stomach all of a sudden.   
It wasn’t like this was the first time him and Ladybug had been this close to each other during a fight, it was just that most of the time in this scenario he was dressed in an all-black leather suit with cat ears resting on his head and a mask covering half his face. This time, however, there were no cat ears and there was no mask. Besides, whenever Chat Noir was so dangerously close to Ladybug she always managed to look away, or stubbornly divert his attention back to the villain at hand, or even sometimes go so far as to physically push his face away. But this time things were different. Because this time rather than looking bored, or frustrated, or even disgusted, Ladybug was entranced.  
He had noticed the differences in the way she acted around certain people, all the way from the Evillustrator to Mayor Bourgeois. He found it particularly amusing to observe her behavior around the Mayor’s daughter Chloe. Ladybug would do anything for any citizen any day of the week, but for some reason every time she was near Chloe she got this tight knot in her forehead and her lips were always turned down, her eyes shimmering with negativity. As someone who understood on a very personal level how difficult dealing with Chloe could be sometimes, he found it refreshing to know that even the ever- impenetrable Ladybug had issues handling certain people as well.  
But above all, he was fascinated by the way Ladybug acted around Adrien Agreste. It was extremely hard not to notice a blush creep to someone’s cheeks or a slight giggle creeping its way out of someone’s throat when you happened to be head-over-tail in love with that someone. And those were just two of the bizarre occurrences that always tended to take over his lady whenever she was around him in his citizen form.   
Ladybug hardly made any exceptions, she was strict, and stern, and professional, and yet, with Adrien in the room she was always distracted in some way or another. It had always stricken him as funny how him constantly flirting with her, and adoring her every action, and loving her with his every breath as Chat Noir had somehow managed only to drive her further away, when all Adrien had to do was breathe a certain way and she was blushing like a mad-woman.   
Then again, there was something depressing and lonely about the change as well. Because Chat Noir was brave, and dastardly, and would do anything he set his mind to, but Adrien wasn’t like that. He could flirt with the girl of his dreams as Chat Noir because the suit and powers gave him confidence, but as Adrien Agreste he was as hopeless to get a sentence out as well… well… Marinette!   
And yet, even Marinette with her constant stuttering was better at showing her true self than he ever had been. Besides, Marinette was so much better in general than he would ever be. She was smart, and funny, and her eyes shone whenever she was talking about something that she loved, and she could stand up to people and speak her mind unli- He frowned. Here he was inches away from Ladybug, her body heat sinking into his, and all he could think about for the moment was Marinette, and how lovely she was with her sweet smiles and innocent eyes that-   
No. He was not in love with Marinette. He had proved that today. He was in love with Ladybug. And he wondered if maybe, just maybe, Ladybug was in love with Adrien. Maybe that was a part of the reason why he had been so quick to believe the rumor that Chloe was Ladybug, because it would have explained her attraction to Adrien. However, it hadn’t been true, leaving him stuck forever in his desperation to know who she was and how she really felt about him. But just as he had been thinking back when he had spoken to Nathalie, even if Ladybug was in love with Adrien, he didn’t have the courage to tell her. No, he would never have the guts to confess unless his claws were out and his leather was on.  
And yet… Had he ever tested that theory? Suddenly, he felt panicked and rushed, new thoughts swarming into his head at odd inconvenient times. This situation was so complex and hard to interpret. He had no idea who loved who, not even when it came to himself. Hell, he didn’t even know himself the way he should, because he didn’t even know whether to define himself as the black cat mask or the boy underneath it. All he knew in that simple moment was that there was a chance the girl he had been fawning over for a long, long time was in love with him as he was now, and that leaning down and kissing her right in that moment would be as easy as snapping his fingers twice.   
And so that’s exactly what he did.

 

Ladybug hadn’t been prepared for an akumatized villain and she hadn’t been prepared to see Adrien standing there with that mindless stance of love and loss, but she certainly hadn’t been prepared for the kiss that had followed her saving him. It wasn’t like this was even the first time she had kissed Adrien Agreste at this point, and yet, it took her so off guard that it was a struggle convincing herself that this wasn’t her first kiss, rather than her third. She hated the blush that rose to her cheeks rapidly as his lips touched down on hers for the second time in the last week. Her yo-yo may have been around his waist, but his arms were completely and entirely free, allowing him to bring his hands up to cup her face and deepen the kiss.- Something she found she didn’t want.  
She tried to convince herself that she wanted to end the kiss because they still needed to fight Lady Mourntague and there was no time to waste, but she knew in her heart that there was something else entirely going on within her. She remembered the way it had felt to be kissed by Adrien on that stage in front of everyone. It had been thrilling, and horrifying, and so blatantly brilliantly real. But this didn’t feel like that. This felt like walking on air, only not in the good way that she would have thought. This was like walking on air only to look down and realize there was nothing beneath you and fall the way they did in the cartoons. It was incredible, but only for an instant, and then the feeling sunk away to oblivion, though the kiss still pressed on.  
She began to wonder maybe if being with Adrien just wasn’t the same when she was Ladybug. Then she realized that didn’t make sense. Whether the mask was on or off she had always remained firmly smitten with the teenage model. That simple fact had never changed - Until now. Suddenly, she realized the problem was not with her, it was with Adrien.  
Adrien was amazing, he was everything she had ever wanted; sweet, talented, smart, understanding, and simply wonderful to be around. And yet, what did any of that matter if he didn’t love her? Because maybe he had initiated this kiss, maybe he cared for Ladybug, but he didn’t care about Marinette in the same way. And that wasn’t enough. That wasn’t enough for her. Maybe Adrien could still be equally amazing as just a friend. Maybe she hadn’t been willing to let him go before, but… Maybe she was ready now.   
She was probably being stupid. She tried to tell herself that Adrien was in love with her if he was in love with Ladybug but the thought didn’t sit right. Once again, Tikki had been right. She had been right about everything. Marinette was more confident as Ladybug, but that didn’t mean that Marinette was any less of a girl than Ladybug was. In fact, Marinette was more a part of her personal identity than Ladybug had ever been. So if she was really so desperate for someone to be in love with her, she didn’t want them to be in love with Ladybug. She didn’t want them to be in love with Marinette, either. Because just Ladybug, or just Marinette, had stopped being good enough for her. She deserved more. From this moment on, if someone was going to love her they needed to love her for Marinette and Ladybug; they needed to love all of her. Otherwise it was hardly love anyway, right?  
Without another thought, without even quite realizing the enormity of what she was doing, she placed her palms against Adrien’s chest, and she pushed him away. Just like that the kiss was ended, the cataclysmic moment really only lasting a few seconds at most. But even though the kiss with her long-time crush was over and would never happen ever again, she felt more complete than she had in a long while.

 

Adrien couldn’t believe what he had just done. He couldn’t believe that he had finally kissed Ladybug - and not been under a villain’s control while doing it- and most of all, he couldn’t believe that it hadn’t been the best experience of his life. Instead it had paled in comparison to the kiss with Marinette. He felt like that should be telling him something, and yet, he was so shocked by the outcome that he couldn’t actually process what any of it meant. He had always been in love with Ladybug, from the day he met her. But Marinette… Marinette had always been a friend. Just a friend. He was so confused that he hardly registered it when Ladybug pushed him off of her.   
His back thudded against the ground, and before he knew it she was unraveling the yo-yo from around his waist, a line feathering in her jaw. For a moment all he felt was pure relief. Then his emotions began to settle into more negative alternatives. Despair, regret, and anger ate him alive until it was all that was left.  
He had just risked everything, put everything out there, only for her to reject him. The reality of it stung him in a way he hadn’t prepared for, which only made it all that much worse. After all this time of Ladybug pushing away his face, ignoring his flirtatious comments, blinking obliviously whenever he was close enough to kiss her, and even standing him up this somehow hurt the most. Because this was the end. He was finished. He had to be, didn’t he? Anything else would be pointless and desperate, because this was a clear refusal. More than that, it was a clear refusal to Adrien Agreste who he had determined she was far more flattered by than she ever had been by Chat Noir. That meant she didn’t love either side of him. And she never would. He had finally lost her. The rift had finally opened.  
Of course, the two of them could still be friends. He loved and respected her too much to ever have his own pain interfere with their relationship, however platonic, and yet, it would still take a while to get used to. In fact, right now he felt in between crying on the floor and slapping Ladybug in the face. He didn’t exactly want to do either of those things, but he needed to get this unrequested ache out of his chest somehow.   
Suddenly, he realized that they still had to fight a villain. It made him feel half-sick to think he’d be fighting the villain with Ladybug. It had been bad enough when he had to fight Glaciator with her after she had stood him up on the beautiful date he had planned, but this? It was like having to work on a group science project with your ex, but on steroids. Besides, now Ladybug knew that both Adrien and Chat Noir were in love with her. Hopefully, she didn’t make the connection that the one random citizen who had kissed her was also the same blonde haired green eyed boy who had been making subtle hints at his affection for so long while fighting by her side. He supposed if she hadn’t pieced it together by now, she never would. He couldn’t tell if that was a good thing or yet another disappointment.  
He shook the thought away, only for an even more pressing one to crash down on him: He still needed to transform.  
As if on cue, Ladybug turned to him, her brow furrowed with a kind of intense concentration he had never seen on her face before, even despite all her professional commitment to being Paris’s superhero. “We need to get you out of this mansion. Now,” She said sternly, and he briefly wondered if part of the urgency was because he had kissed her and she didn’t know how to handle that. He couldn't wait to get the ‘There’s a boy…’ speech from Ladybug for the second time. “Unfortunately, since Chat Noir still hasn’t had the decency to show up yet, we’re going to have to improvise,” she said the sentence with a bit of a chuckle in her voice but he interpreted it in a far more negative fashion, causing the hair on his neck to bristle in frustration. “Is there anywhere you can go where you’re sure you’ll be safe until I’ve gotten this situation under control?”  
Despite his somewhat indescribable irritation at the moment, he still knew a good opportunity when he heard it and excitement flooded him at the thought of becoming someone else, if only for a little while.   
“Yes,” he said, nodding briskly. “In my bathroom. I’ll be safe there.”   
Ladybug gave him a slight quizzical look then nodded with a kind smile that felt like a slap to the face for some reason. Because that smile was the not the kind of thing you wanted to see on the face of someone you loved. It was a pitying smile, a ‘you’re sweet but…’ kind of smile. And it hurt.   
He didn’t allow himself to mull over that fact any more as he swept his way across the room, ducking behind his bathroom door. As soon as he had closed it behind him, Plagg was floating lazily out of his jacket pocket.  
“Do we really have to transform now?” Plagg groaned. Adrien wished he could have laughed it off, but right now he was out of patience, not that that was saying much considering he was always nearly out of patience with Plagg.  
“I don’t have time for your whining today Plagg, Ladybug needs us, alright?” He snapped, but some of the words came out awkward in a sad way that made him cringe. He hated sounding so vulnerable.  
Plagg blinked at the despaired tone in his voice and turned, looking like he was about to inquire about what was wrong, which meant Adrien must have sounded horrible if even Plagg was getting concerned, but Adrien cut him off before he could, saying, “Plagg, claws out!”  
Just like that, he was a different person. He loved how easy it was. With three words and just the right amount of camembert he had gone from famous fashion designer’s son to superhero. He looked at himself in the mirror. How impossible it seemed that something as simple as a mask and cat ears could mean so much to him, and so much to so many different people. And yet, here he was. He smiled to himself.  
That day that box had shown up in his room had been the best of his life, partially because that’s the day he had discovered this side of him just waiting to break free - a side of him destined to save Paris and love every second of it- but partially because it was the day he had met Ladybug. That day seemed decades away now, the memories completely insurmountable. Ladybug felt legions away, or further, even though she was right outside the door.   
Right outside the door… He remembered back when they had been fighting Volpina. He had been talking to Ladybug through the door and he had placed his hand and face against the wood, closing his eyes in a peaceful moment full of longing. Back then he had the strange feeling that perhaps Ladybug was on the other side of the door doing the exact same thing… It had been stupid, he knew, and yet, he hadn’t been able to shake the feeling. But now that couldn’t be further than what was going on in his head. He knew Ladybug was not leaned against the door. She wasn’t there. He had never felt so far from her in his life…   
He sighed. He didn’t have time to get caught up in his befuddling emotions. He had a villain to face. He was just glad he had finally transformed because that meant Nathalie couldn’t use his mother against him again. He shuttered, then with one final reminder that Ladybug needed him he leaped out of his bathroom window, and passed over across the roof, booming in theatrically from the window that Ladybug had left open upon her arrival.  
“Chat Noir! Finally!” Ladybug grinned in the middle of her sparring with Lady Montague. The words and tone were annoyed but there was a certain sparkle in her eye- one that broke his heart, because now he knew for sure that her eyes would never shine with love for him the way he so desperately wished they would. 

 

Truthfully, Ladybug had probably only been here without Chat for ten or twenty minutes, but it felt like it had been centuries. She nearly doubled over with relief as she watched him enter through the window. It had been far far too long since she had last seen him. She had missed his charming half-smile and loose carefree jokes. She needed a bit of carefree essence in her life right about now. She smiled just thinking about the ever present light in his green eyes even as she kicked Lady Mourntague in the chest, knocking her backwards and making her shriek with fury.  
She spun around towards Chat who extended his rod, instantly in a fighting stance. She was somewhat surprised by his instant focus without even a singular sly comment, but she supposed she should be proud, so she simply smiled and got into a similar stance next to him.   
Lady Mourntague was lunging back at them quickly. She spun her staff so that the clipboard nearly smacked Ladybug right in the face, but she ducked just far enough that it skimmed the top of her head. She tried to bring up her hand fast enough to grasp the scepter in her awaiting palm, but it was already back by Lady Mourntague’s side before she closed her fingers. She straightened to see Chat Noir knocking Lady Mourntague’s feet out from under her, causing her to crash to the ground.   
She looked over at him, beaming, but he averted his eyes immediately. She blinked, confused. She was about to communicate that the akuma was likely within the clipboard and that they had to get it from her, but suddenly Lady Mourntague was getting up off the ground and every thought faded away. Because Lady Mourntague was not scrambling to her feet like she should be, but rather floating upwards into the air. Great, she thought. Of course she can fly. Why wouldn’t she be able to fly?  
She bit back a groan as Lady Mourntague soared above both of them, landing firmly behind them. Before Ladybug could do anything Chat was lunging forwards. He tackled the villain to the ground, and the two of them wrestled relentlessly on the ground. Ladybug frowned, confused at the sudden determined spirit of Chat. Of course, he was always willing and capable to get the job done, but this level of focus and intensity was unlike him. Let alone the hurt and unusually blunt look that had been in his eyes as he had ripped them away from her. All this on top of the abrupt kiss that Adrien had given her so passionately just minutes before. What was going on today?  
Her confusion only heightened as she looked back down at Chat as he raised his arm to deal a blow to… Chat. She shook her head, blinking rapidly but the image didn’t go away. She was seeing double. There were two Chat Noir’s wrestling on the ground in front of her. She had severe Copycat deja vu and suddenly she just wanted to change back to Marinette and trudge her way home, forgetting her responsibilities for a little while. She was too tired and upset for this insanity.  
But she had no choice. She had to save Adrien. After all, he was still one of her best friends, even if she had finally let go of the idea of loving him. As far as Chat Noir went…   
There was nothing to say. Everything was exactly the same except now the villain was disguised as him. Suddenly, she wondered why. Why had Lady Mourntague decided to disguise herself as Chat? She remembered coming into the room to see Adrien’s mother, only for the image to flicker slowly into the villain she had expected to see. So what was the connection between Emilie Agreste and Chat Noir?   
They’re both distant.  
She frowned at that thought. That didn’t make any sense. Because Chat Noir was right in front of her. He wasn’t gone the way Gabriel’s wife was. And yet, he still felt far away… She saw that sad look all over again and nearly fell to the ground with pain as she realized the meaning behind Lady Mourntague’s name. She showed her opponent the person they wanted back the most, the person they longed for but couldn’t quite have. And right now for her that was Chat Noir. She had been craving his laughter and his charisma, only for him to come through the window without it. And she missed him. She missed him even though he was right in front of her.   
The realization made the fact that Lady Mourntague had changed into him that much more frustration. It felt like a taunt. There were two Chat Noir’s in front of her, and yet she was still unhappy, because neither one of them was the one she wanted - the one that she needed so utterly in this moment that she didn’t even know anything anymore. Blood rushed into her ears and she nearly screamed with the force of it all. - No, she did scream with the force of it.   
“Chat, stop it!” She cried, her voice breaking through the chaos and causing everything to come to an intense halt.   
Both the Chat Noir’s spun around, staring up at her, both in a nearly identical position, which only stressed her out even more. And yet, the thing that made her lip tremble was the fact that she still wasn’t sure whether she had been telling him to stop fighting or to stop being so cold. This was all so stupid. He hadn’t even said anything, only had a certain amount of despair in his eyes, and yet she was floundering to fix the situation when she should be fighting Lady Mourntague. Right. If she could somehow get her hands on that akuma then this would all be over and she could talk to Chat and mend whatever was wrong.   
She took a deep breath and stared skeptically at each Chat Noir. Neither one moved, as if waiting to see what she did next. They didn’t even look at each other. An uncomfortable heat came over her; the kind that generated based entirely off the stress booming in her chest, making her sweat and ache all over.   
“Get up,” she muttered and each Chat Noir did so, each with brutal efficiency.   
They both stood there, looking at each other and it was as if she could see the wheels in both their brains churning. One was no doubt thinking about how they would go about stealing both Ladybug and Chat Noir’s miraculous, the other about how to make Ladybug see they were the real Chat Noir and had no evil plans. The only problem was she couldn’t read minds, so she had no idea which was pondering which. She just had to make sure that neither Chat Noir moved until she had figured it out, otherwise both her and the real Chat were doomed.   
Frustrated and out of ideas, she called out desperately, “Lucky charm!”   
A crowbar fell in her hands and she frowned. What could she possibly do with a crowbar? Suddenly her eyes caught on the couch directly behind both the Chat Noirs. Before she could have another thought she was leaping up into the air, over the heads of her friend and Paris’s new villain. She flipped in the air, until she landed solidly on the couch cushions. Having no time to be winded she propped her leg up on the top of the couch and used her weight to push the furniture forward, crushing both the Chat Noir’s underneath it. They both squirmed, but to no avail. They were stuck. She peered down at them, satisfied, and waited for one to speak so she could determine which was real and which was fake.  
“Ladybug,” one said and her head whipped around to hear him. “We’ve been in this situation before and we got through it. We can get through it again, but you’re going to have to trust me. I am the real Chat Noir. Please, Ladybug.”  
We’ve been in this situation before. That Chat Noir knew about Copycat, which meant he must be the real one. And yet, if Lady Mourntague had the power to sense who you were distant from, who said she wouldn’t be able to imitate them well enough to make it believable? Besides, Ladybug and Chat Noir were both famous public figures, so knowing about Copycat wasn’t exactly proof enough for her to go on.  
She bit her lip with uncertainty and turned towards the other Chat Noir, not sure what else to do. The other Chat Noir just shrugged. That could either mean that Lady Mourntague was struggling to think of something to top the real Chat Noir, or that the real Chat Noir was mad at her for some reason or was trying to test how well she knew him. Either way, she had no more answers than she had before.   
The other Chat Noir started talking again saying, “Ladybug, I love you.”   
She instantly stiffened with surprise. She remembered Chat Noir sitting on her balcony, exposing the true depth of his feelings towards Ladybug to Marinette, without realizing what he had done. She remembered the kiss he had pressed to her cheek and the rose he had put in her palm when she had confronted him about it as Ladybug and explained her feelings for Adrien as best she could without giving anything away about her identity. Chat Noir loved her, that was true. But whether this was really him, she still didn’t know. It didn’t seem right for him to be bringing something like that up at this moment, and yet, if he was trying to convince her he was real then she supposed it made sense…   
“I always have, and I always will,” he continued, and the words touched her in a way she didn’t really expect them to. “No matter what. No matter who you are beneath the mask. Now please. Take Lady Mourntague’s akuma while you still can.”  
The other Chat Noir spoke up finally, “She’s lying. I don’t love you, Ladybug. Not anymore.”   
Ladybug’s heart sunk for some reason. She had never wanted Chat’s love in the first place, so then why did those words sting so badly?   
Wait a second. She was such a fool. Those words shouldn't’ have been upsetting, but rather pleasant. Jubilant even. Because those words had not been Chat Noir’s. There was no way. She had seen the look in his eyes that night on the balcony. He loved Ladybug and he would love her forever, no matter if she returned the love or not. Besides, of course Lady Mourntague would know the perfect way to make her feel even further from Chat in that moment. But she shouldn’t be upset or angry at the villain for those harsh words. She should be thanking her for making this so glaringly obvious. She smiled.  
“Congratulation, Lady Mourntague,” she said triumphantly, putting her hands on her hips. “You just gave yourself away.”  
She jumped off the plush cushions of the couch and hooked the crowbar underneath the top, pulling hard so that the couch jerked upwards again. Each Chat Noir scrambled to their feet, but she only had eyes for one. She jumped back onto the couch cushions and jumped over the top so she was standing in front of him. Then she swung her crowbar hard, trying to destabilize the fake hero so she could capture her akuma and de-evilize her. Lady Mourntague staggered backwards, closely avoiding the metallic fury of her lucky charm.   
“Wait! Ladybug!” she cried, but Ladybug wasn’t going to fall for it. She had already given herself up, so any attempt to redeem herself was pointless.   
“Can it, Shakespeare!” she hissed, then called, without looking back over her shoulder. “Care to lend a helping paw, Chat?”   
Lady Mourntague pulled out her silver rod, identical to Chat Noir’s and extended it. She swung it hard just as Ladybug did the same with her crowbar. The two weapons collided harshly and she strained to keep her grit. Finally, she gave up on the crowbar advance, though continuing to press it against the rod, rendering the rival weapon useless. She grabbed hold of her yo-yo with her free hand, flinging it outwards towards Lady Mourntague’s free arm. It wrapped around her wrist, and she yanked downwards, knocking her opponent off balance. Ladybug then vaulted herself towards her, thrusting out her right leg so it slammed into the rod, sending it clattering to the ground. By the time she landed she was on top of Lady Mourntague who she had successfully unarmed and pinned to the ground.  
“Now where is that pesky akuma, huh, Lady Mourntague?” she asked, retracting her yo-yo and placing it back on her waist. She frowned thoughtfully. This version of Lady Mourntague certainly didn’t have a scepter, so where might the akuma have transferred when she had changed her appearance? She glanced at Chat Noir’s ring. Of course. Lady Mourntague was after their miraculous, so why shouldn’t the akuma be in the fake replication of one? It was just the sort of cruel irony that Hawkmoth relished. She wrapped her fingers around the piece of jewelry and began to slide it off and Lady Mourntague shook her head rapidly in protest, her eyes wide. Ladybug ignored her, calling over her shoulder, “Chat, I’m going to need you to use your cataclysm. There’s no way I can break this ring.”   
Suddenly, Lady Mourntague began to speak. “Please, milady…” she said, and Ladybug had to hand it to her- it was a near flawless impression. Then she saw the way the villain was looking at her. There was so much raw emotion in those green eyes. Ladybug blinked, doubt crashing in on her for a moment, only for her to shake her head, banishing the thoughts. They were exactly what Hawkmoth and Lady Mourntague wanted her to be thinking. “Chat!” she called, and looked back to see Chat Noir falling forward with a snarl on his face.  
She jolted as she realized his fingers had been inches away from her earrings, only for her movement to throw him off balance. But Chat Noir wouldn’t be after her miraculous, unless… Before she even had time to be shocked, the Chat Noir she had pinned to the ground - the real Chat Noir - grabbed the crowbar from out of her hands and smacked the other Chat Noir - Lady Mourntague- with it. Lady Mourntague went flying across the room, and Ladybug stared, stunned.  
She had been wrong. She had been very wrong. How had she let this happen? She shuttered. When she had fought Copycat she had figured out which Chat Noir was in love with her, and that had been the fake one. The same had applied this time. The Chat Noir that didn’t love her had been the real one in the end. I don’t love you. Not anymore. A twinge of hurt flashed through her heart. What did that mean? What had happened since that simple kiss that had been pressed onto her cheek, causing her to blush in the depth of the night? She sighed, a sudden sadness filling her heart in a way she couldn’t explain, and never would have anticipated.   
Suddenly, she heard someone clear their throat, and looked down to remember she was still on top of Chat Noir. She mumbled some excuse, flustered out of her mind, and stood up so fast her head spun. She held out her hand shyly to Chat Noir who smiled in thanks and pulled himself upwards, so his face was only mere inches from hers. She felt a blush creep to her cheeks, but instead of her dear friend raising his eyebrows or leaning closer he simply took a few fatal steps back. She tried to pretend that didn’t bother her.  
She didn’t know what was going on anymore. She had fawned over Adrien for so long, and yet, when he had kissed her it had been all wrong and she had put a stop to it. Now the flirtatious annoying boy that had pursued her, despite her clear disinterest was no longer after her heart and that thought… That thought upset her.   
“I… I’m sorry,” she muttered, realizing piece by piece that she had just assaulted her best friend with a crowbar. “I just thought because…”  
“Whatever happened to your ‘no-brainer’?” he asked and she blinked at the unexpected amount of contempt in his voice.   
She remembered what she had said to him when they had been fighting Copycat so long ago: Once I figured out which cat was really in love with me, it was a no-brainer. She flinched as she realized that Chat had likely been in love with her back when she had said that too, meaning that must have been an extremely hard moment for him. Come to think of it, being in love with someone as ignorant and professional as she was had probably been insanely challenging, especially since she had never given him the time of day even after she had known. Maybe that’s why he could no longer love her anymore. Maybe she had made it seem not worth it. Her heart sunk at the thought that she could really be so unlovable, even as her head tried to convince her that it was a very similar situation to her and Adrien and she was now off-the-hook. That thought didn’t quite sit right for some reason.  
She felt pathetic and lonely, and suddenly all she wanted to do was wrap her arms around Chat the way he had after she had escaped the t-rex version of Animan. But that idea felt impossible right now. She supposed Lady Mourntague had been a more capable smart villain than she had given her credit for. Lady Mourntague. She had almost forgotten.  
She walked over to where she was sprawled out on the ground, her eyelids flickering as her appearance slowly took on that of Lady Mourntague rather than Chat Noir. Ladybug grabbed her scepter and snapped it across her knee. An akuma fluttered outwards, and she quickly caught it with her yo-yo. She then released it, it’s color cleansed into a suffocatingly brilliant color white that burned at Ladybug’s eyelids.   
“Bye bye little butterfly,” she murmured, and in that moment she felt like she was bidding farewell to a lot more than just the flawless little creature above her. For she had said goodbye to Adrien Agreste today, at least in the way she had known him. But more than that, Chat Noir had said goodbye to her.   
She sighed then forced herself to smile, though she still felt dull and empty as she exclaimed, “Miraculous Ladybug!” tossing her crowbar up in the air. Everything was re-set through her power, returning back to the crystal clear perfection it had been before.  
Chat Noir crossed over to her, and she wanted to say something to him, but she wasn’t entirely sure what. Instead, she just held out her fist expectantly. He blinked, as if he had forgotten all about the custom, which just sent an unwelcome shiver down her spine. But then he smiled and pounded his fist against hers lightly. “Pound it!” they said in perfect synchronization.   
Then Chat was walking away from her, towards the other end of the room, even though she had seen that he still had three paw-pads left on his ring. She debated calling him back, but the idea didn’t make much sense so she kept her mouth shut. Finally, just as Chat reached the window he turned back and murmured quietly, “Catch you next time, Ladybug.” Then he jumped out the window, and she was alone.  
She waved back at him in a daze, watching out of the corner of her eye as Adrien’s butler Nathalie got up from where Lady Mourntague had once been. Normally she would have checked to make sure that Adrien was okay, but Nathalie was already scrambling towards the door to do just that, so she let her go on without her. And in that moment she knew that maybe this time the simple words ‘Miraculous Ladybug’ couldn’t put everything back to normal after all… 

 

Chat Noir had to leap out the window, sprint across the roof, and dive back into his bathroom for what felt like the millionth time. Akumatized villains needed to stop having a beef with him. How did he even make that many people angry anyway? He sighed. Maybe the man who was the fabled Hawkmoth had something personal against him and wanted to enact some sort of revenge. He scoffed lightly. The only adult who had any sort of issue with him was his own father, but of course he was far too busy for his own son, so there was no way he could be Hawkmoth. He supposed every one of his teachers probably had an eye on him by now as well, considering he had to skip half his classes every other day. Luckily they weren’t going to expel Gabriel Agreste’s son. At least he could thank his father for that.   
He shook his head. “Plagg, claws in,” he murmured.   
Suddenly, as soon as the words were out of his mouth, he heard a knock on the door. He walked forwards slowly, guilt filling him about the way he had treated Ladybug. He may have been upset with her, but it had nothing to do with the way she had treated Chat Noir, and she was still his best friend, so he really shouldn’t have acted that way.  
“Hey, I’m really sorry…” he said slowly as he opened up the door, forgetting for a moment that he had acted rudely as Chat not Adrien so his apology wouldn’t make sense, only for Nathalie to be staring back at him, rather than his superhero partner.  
She smiled way wider than he had ever seen the stoic woman smile in the past, only for her to self-consciously turn it into a casual frown, though her lips still twitched. The unusual expression made him laugh, a real true laugh that bubbled out of him. He couldn’t remember a laugh like that, since back when he had first met Marinette. It felt good to laugh again. Before he even registered it himself, he was throwing his arms around Nathalie, holding her tight, the gratitude seeping outwards into the force of the son-like intimacy. In a way he was glad that Nathalie had been akumatized, because it had made him realize just how much she was there for him on a daily basis. Somehow he had become so caught up in all the things he didn’t have - a present mother or an enthusiastic father - that he had taken for granted what he did have. But not anymore.  
Nathalie was stiff and awkward in his arms only to relax into a more soft gentle presence, her hands patting his back briefly. Then she pulled away, clearing her throat, and yet, he knew that for him, as well as for her, that simple hug had lasted centuries. He smiled softly at her and she smiled back, then turned to go.   
“Nathalie,” he said, stopping her.  
“Yes Adrien?” she asked politely.   
“I would be honored if you would come to my show.”  
Nathalie smiled again, biting her lip to keep the force of it from undoing her perfectly refined face. She nodded delicately and a bright light churned in his stomach making him feel light and happy for the first time since… Well, since he had last seen Marinette… Only that had been a different kind of feeling, stronger perhaps. He tucked that information away for later.   
Suddenly, just as Nathalie had turned away once again, the door to his room came flying open. Nathalie and Adrien’s heads both whirled around, eyes widening. Through his door marched Gabriel Agreste, his ever-present scowl even deeper on his long face.   
“Adrien! What’s the meaning of this?” he asked, his volume far from yelling, and yet, for a man as timid and calm as Gabriel, he might as well have been.   
“I… Father what are you talking about?” Adrien blubbered.  
“What am I talking about? We’re on the news Adrien! What could you possibly have said to Nathalie to akumatize her like that!” Adrien and Nathalie just stared at him, frozen. Gabriel stared back, then dropped his gaze and sighed. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have blown up like that,” his voice was back to its familiar monotone seriousness, which in some way just seemed worse. “It’s just… You need to be careful Adrien, what, with Hawkmoth ruling this city from behind the scenes. It’s dangerous. This is exactly the reason I didn’t want you going to school…”  
Adrien blinked, anger suddenly swelling up in his chest. He understood that his father just wanted to protect him, but if he only payed more attention maybe he would realize who he really was - and that he didn’t need protecting, in fact he was the one protecting this city from the villain ‘ruling it from behind the scenes’.   
“Look Dad, school’s not the problem, okay? If you just-” he started, but his father cut him off… As usual.  
“Don’t talk back to me.” he said with lethal quiet.   
“As in don’t sass you, or as in you just don’t really like the idea of having an actual conversation with your son?” he shot back. “Or do you even know the difference anymore…?” he muttered.  
Anger fueled deep in Gabriel’s eyes in a way Adrien hadn’t seen in a long time. Not that he saw his father very often anyway these days.   
“I’m done,” his father whispered. “You’re grounded.”  
Adrien's eyes widened, even though this was all too typical. “Wait, but Dad I-” panic gripped him hard as he realized he had to perform the show tomorrow, and another the next day. He had to be able to go. He was playing the lead.  
Gabriel sighed, as if he too remembered the show and murmured. “Fine. You can attend whatever performances you have to, but other than that you won’t be leaving this house until you learn to get your manners back.” His voice was iron and his movements were swift. He swept his way out of the room, and just like that, it was final, without Adrien even getting in another word.   
Nathalie turned to say something, only for her mouth to snap shut as Gabriel called for her outside his door. Obediently, she scuttled out of the room, with one last apologetic look at Adrien. Once she was gone, he flopped down face-first on his bed. He groaned loudly, then spun over so he was on his back, staring up blankly at the ceiling.   
He thought through all the events that had happened over the past few days. Just a little over a week ago he had his first kiss - or at least the first one that counted anyway- with his best friend Marinette. Since then he had accidentally been incredibly rude to her to levels he did not want to consider, following the same pattern with his butler Nathalie, resulting in another akumatized villain. Of course, that had led to him kissing his long-time crush Ladybug as Adrien Agreste. Unfortunately, she had rejected him quiet thoroughly, causing him to be rude to her as well in the form of Chat Noir, which was something truthfully she hadn’t deserved at all. Overall, he had been awful to everyone he cared about, and now he was grounded. He supposed it was a fitting punishment, and yet, there was no way he was backing down to the word of his father without a fight, especially not at a time like this.  
“I just don’t get it Plagg,” he muttered. “Why can’t he see how miserable I am? And if he does, then why doesn’t he do anything? He realizes I’m his son right? He realizes I’m all he has left of a fam-” he sighed, not wanting to finish that sentence.  
“Ah, come on, Adrien. Cheer up, will ya?” Plagg said softly, and for a moment Adrien thought he was being as insensensitive as usual, only to realize there was a detectable twinge of sympathy in his voice; something that for Plagg was rare.  
Adrien sat up and offered his buddy a small smile. “I’m sorry, Plagg. I’m trying. I just… I don’t understand him sometimes.” Only he knew that wasn’t true. Because right now, the reason he was really so upset wasn’t because he didn’t understand his father’s tendencies, but rather because he felt he understood them a little too much. He had been just as disconnected and harsh with all of his loved ones recently too. Those thoughts led to the most horrifying question possible: Was he turning into his father?  
He shook his head, not wanting to even consider something so concerning. He buried his face in his hands in despair, only for a hard iron resolve to begin in his chest. When he straightened there was a smile on his face. “I have to get out of here Plagg,” he said quietly.  
Plagg groaned. “What’s so bad about being grounded anyway? It’s an excuse to stay in one place and eat camembert all day.” Plagg got a starstruck far-away look in his eyes and murmured, “That’s the dream.” Adrien raised an eyebrow and Plagg threw up his hands defensively. “Alright, alright. It doesn’t have to be camembert exactly. It could be any kind of cheese! It could be blue cheese, or feta...”  
“Plagg,” Adrien interrupted, but his kwami didn’t hear him. Or, more likely, he ignored him.  
“Or havarti, or brie…”   
“Plagg…”  
“Or gouda, or… I guess cheddar, if you like that sort of thing…”  
“Plagg!” Adrien cried, and his kwami finally stopped, looking defeated.  
“Fine,” he whined, the shimmer in his huge green eyes slowly battled by the contempt suddenly filling them at the idea of actually doing something. “Say the words.”  
Adrien smiled, shooting to his feet and enthusiastically exclaiming, “Plagg, claws out!”  
With one final groan Plagg flooded into his ring and the transformation followed, as swift and easy as a change of clothes, when they both knew it was far far more than that - both literally and figuratively. Adrien felt hundreds of times better once he was dressed in the familiar leathers of his super-hero alternative. Adrien slowly dripped away and Chat Noir replaced him. An easy smile spread across his lips and it felt crooked and confident in comparison to his shy confined version.   
He didn’t even spend time to consider where he was going, or what he was going to do, or when he was coming home. He just slipped stealthily out the window like it was nothing, because for Chat Noir it was. He extended his rod and used it to maneuver the city, enjoying the feel of the wind in his thick blonde hair, and the subtle burn of city lights against his eyelids as night fell neatly upon the streets of Paris. He didn’t stop until he reached a house, hardly even processing whose it was, until he saw the old letters over the door spelling out the word Lahiffe. His subconscious had made a very good decision. Hanging out with Nino was exactly what he needed right now. It was simple, and fun, and Nino always knew exactly how to cheer him up when he felt down. Besides, hanging out with a best friend that he hadn’t kissed earlier that week, would help take his mind off of Ladybug and whatever weird feelings were going on inside him lately.  
“Plagg, claws in,” he whispered, and his kwami tucked himself back into his jacket pocket. He raised his hand to knock on Nino’s door only to catch sight of him out of the corner of his eye through the window.  
Nino was seated on the couch in the living room in front of the TV, which would have been perfect if it wasn’t for the person sitting next to him. Adrien peered closer, recognizing Alya’s russet curls and familiar fiery plaid flannel. Her head was leaned casually on Nino’s shoulder and she was watching whatever movie was on with intense interest. Nino wasn’t quite so focused on the screen, however. Instead his eyes continued to flick downwards to observe Alya’s responses. Even though he looked at her every other moment, his face was always refreshed with a new smile every single time.   
Nino’s eyes finally focused back on the screen and he reached for a handful of popcorn from the bowl on his lap, only for his hand to bump into Alya’s as she reached as well. Both their hands shot backwards and even from outside the window Adrien could see the prevalent blush finding its way to his smitten pal’s cheek. Alya threw her head back in a way that made it glaringly obvious she was laughing. Nino averted his eyes, a kind of pure genuine embarrassment creeping into them as he did so, only for Alya to intertwine their fingers. Nino gaped, then smiled, leaning his head against Alya’s as he used his free hand to grasp more popcorn.  
Adrien smiled. He felt bad for having accidentally observed such a private moment, and yet, his heart couldn’t help but burn in happiness for his friends. They truly loved each other. And they deserved that love and that joy. Every bit of it. He tried to banish the slight envy that wrapped its cold fingers around his heart, but whatever he did it was still there, collapsing his smile just enough for Plagg to notice from where he had peered out impatiently from inside Adrien’s jacket.  
Plagg blinked, then asked bluntly, “Does this mean we can go home now?”   
“No. Not quite yet.”  
Plagg sighed exaggeratedly. “So where are we going then?”  
“...Marinette’s,” Adrien responded, and he couldn’t help the slight cheer in his voice.  
“Ohhhh, I see how it is,” Plagg murmured back only semi-irritably. “Nino can’t hang out because he’s with his girlfriend, so you figured you’d spend some quality time with yours too.”  
Adrien hardly batted an eyelash. He was used to this kind of torment from Plagg by now. “I’ve told you Plagg: Marinette is not my girlfriend.”  
“Well, yeah, maybe not yet, anyway. But do you want her to be?”  
That question sunk deep into Adrien’s soul. Suddenly he wished Plagg would go back to talking about cheese. Or complaining. Anything other than asking questions that he couldn’t answer. The way Marinette’s lips had felt against his flashed back harshly in his mind, followed by the more subtle presence of how her body heat had complimented his own and the way her soft hands had caressed his cheek. Do you want her to be?   
His throat tightened and he blinked rapidly, evicting the memories from their home in his mind. “Plagg claws out,” he mumbled.  
“Wait, but you didn’t answer my-” Plagg protested, but it was too late: Adrien had already transformed, and was now zooming through the city of Paris once again, this time headed for a very special balcony he had visited many times before.

 

When Chat reached Marinette’s balcony darkness had consumed the city of Paris and lights were twinkling out slowly. He worried that she might be asleep, in which case he supposed he would just go back home - which at the moment sounded like stomping his way back into Hell after he had just crawled out. He crouched down by the small trapdoor that led down into Marinette’s room and was about to knock timidly, when it flung open, smacking him in the nose. He cried out in pain, shooting backwards as his hand came up to cradle his aching face.  
“Omigod!” Marinette squealed, her hands over her mouth, eyes wide as she peeped up out of the door, staring at her accidental victim. “Chat! What are you doing here?” she shrieked, but laughter disrupted her words, making them awkward and distorted.  
He wanted to glare at her or show some sort of disdain that showed how much that had hurt but there she was, in her pajamas, the slight breeze tossing her hair in wild strands across her face that was red with embarrassment, and she was laughing, a delicate genuine smile playing across her gentle lips. Suddenly all he could do was smile.   
“You miss me, Princess?” he asked lightly and she giggled, causing his heart to light up.   
Before he could even process what was happening, Marinette was throwing herself off her staircase, onto the balcony, crashing into his body, her arms wrapped around him. His eyes widened at the unexpected content and for a moment he just sat there, not breathing, his back stiff, letting her hold him. Then he smiled, a slow satisfying smile and wrapped his arms around her, gripping her tightly and burying his face in the crook of her neck. He was confused. He was so confused. Why had he ever gone to Nino’s house? Why hadn’t he come here immediately? Every one of his troubles melted away under the touch of Marinette, making him feel complete and whole again. She was his best friend. She was all he ever needed and her comfort had transformed him in a way that not even Plagg could.  
Finally, after what felt like centuries of simply holding each other, Marinette pulled away, clearing her throat. “I’m sorry,” she muttered, a light blush creeping to her cheeks that made his heart stop, though he wasn’t sure why. “It’s just… I haven’t seen you in… A while.” She smiled lightly and he got the sense that she was looking for some kind of reassurance that he hadn’t found her immediate act of affection weird or unprompted.  
“No, of course,” he said, a slight laugh in his voice. “I mean, you were probably scared. What, without a big strong man like myself to protect you. Paris can be a scary place you know, Marinette.” He flexed his muscle overbearingly for emphasis.  
“Oh yeah, right,” she muttered, shoving his arm so he was forced to cease his show of manliness. “And you’re really one to talk, huh, whiskers? What would you do if Ladybug wasn’t there to protect you? Use your little bell to battle the akumas?” she teased, flicking the bell at his collar so it made a breezy tinkling sound.  
He grabbed her hand abruptly before she pulled it away, and she blinked at the sudden seriousness in his face as he said, “Hey. Don’t joke around about my little bell.”   
He smiled at her devilishly and she retaliated by hitting him with her free hand repeatedly. Then, just for extra measure he brought the hand he still held up to his lips and placed a dainty kiss there. He peered up at her as his lips touched her skin to see a small flutter of a grin creeping into her face, an odd look in her eyes. He didn’t know how to describe the emotions he saw flickering there, and yet, he could have sworn he felt them in his own chest as well.   
His throat went suddenly dry and he swallowed, releasing her hand, and easing his way to his feet. He walked calmly up to where her balcony cut off and hoisted himself up onto the gate, kicking one of his feet over the edge, and draping his hand casually over his other knee. Marinette joined him and he smiled side-long at her. For a moment the two of them just sat there, breathing in the night air and looking at the city below them, occasionally sneaking little glances towards the other.   
One time Chat ended up staring at Marinette for a bit longer than he wanted to admit. He couldn’t tell if it was because she was simply so much more beautiful tonight than Paris could ever be, or because the whimsical light in her bluebell eyes was amusing given the fact that she lived in this city and saw it everyday, and yet, she could still manage to be so eerily captivated. Either way the thoughts frightened him in a way that also sent a thrill itching down his spine.  
She caught him looking at her, and a blush rose to her cheeks, which only made the horrific thrill within him turn to blue fire and ricochet off his insides. Embarrassment flooded him at the sensation and it must have done the same to her because the two of them both started talking in flustered exasperated tones at the exact same time:  
“So why ex-”  
“So how’s-”  
Marinette’s words fizzled out at the exact same time as his and they stared nervously at each other, as if concerned if they tried to speak again the same atrocious results would occur.  
“What were you going to say?” Chat asked finally, breaking the disturbing silence.  
“Oh nothing… It was stupid anyway. What about you?”  
He looked at her and a sort of sadness filled him at the sight of her large eyes darting away from his rapidly. It was almost like a sort of pity for her eating him up inside, only not precisely. Because he could never pity someone like Marinette. You pitied people who had nothing going for them or were likely to never go anywhere in life, and Marinette certainly didn’t fall into either of those categories. It was more of a subtle kind of frustration fueled by the fact that she was clearly so self-conscious and lacked so much confidence, despite the fact that she was so incredible. He wanted to hold up a mirror or shake her by the shoulders and remind her that she was Marinette Dupain Cheng, because if she were to remember that she would also remember how awesome she was.   
Unfortunately, there was nothing he could do. Because she was too wonderful. If he wanted to remind her of how great she was, it would take all night, and right now they didn’t have that kind of time. So instead he did the next best thing, and shook his head. “No. You go first. I want to hear what you had to say. If it was stupid, I’ll just have to have the painful memory seared into my brain forever.”  
Marinette chuckled at his joking manner, then murmured nervously, “I… I was just going to ask you how Ladybug is doing.”  
Chat Noir blinked. “Ladybug? Aren’t you guys like best friends or something?”  
For a second Marinette looked like she was about to throw up but then she blabbered out, “Well, yeah! Of course! It’s just that she… She hasn’t stopped by in a while, and I was starting to get worried. And then with… With Lady Mourntague! And I figured you would know! And-”  
Chat laughed. “Alright, alright. You don’t need to take an hour to explain.” Marinette smiled forcefully and he could have sworn he saw her eye twitch. He ignored it and tapped his chin with mock thoughtfulness. “Hmmm, let me see. Ladybug. Well, she’s just about as good as usual. You know, fighting crime, disappearing without a trace, beating the moth out of villians. Same old, same old…” his words were casual enough but there was a slight twinge in his voice from the new dull feeling left by the absence of his need to be with his spotted mystery mistress.   
“Well… I sort of meant more like, how are things going with, you know, you and Ladybug.”  
The dull feeling deepened, leaving what felt more like a sizable divot in his chest.   
“Oh,” he muttered.   
An awkward silence stretched out between them as he debated just how much he wanted to reveal. It wasn’t like him and Ladybug were enemies now, or like his recent lack of affection for her was some scandalous secret, it just all felt awfully fresh and stressful to deal with at the moment. Besides he had come here to escape his thoughts about Ladybug, not be confronted about them by Marinette, the very girl his heart was starting to have extremely mixed feelings about.  
“See, I was watching something on the Ladyblog,” Marinette said quietly. “It was an interview with, um, Ladybug and she was saying how you told her you didn’t love her anymore.”  
Chat sighed. He supposed word got around a lot faster than he would have expected. If it weren’t for all the good quality videos of Ladybug that he watched on repeat, he would have asked Alya to shut it down by now. On the bright side, that dilemma shouldn’t be a problem anymore. Somehow that thought just made everything so much worse… The idea that maybe Ladybug just wasn’t right for him didn’t hurt nearly as much as the idea that he had lost something so bulging as the love he had dedicated so much of his time to.   
Love wasn’t just some hand-me-down car you got from a relative that you hardly appreciated and sold immediately for a better one. No, love was an old beat-up car that you took from the junkyard and put weeks and weeks of time into fixing up, until it shone like the evening sun. Watching something so beautiful and pride inducing be crushed in a self- caused car accident was enough to bring your heart to your throat and tears to your eyes.   
“Chat?” the word flung him back to real life, where Marinette was staring at him, waiting for him to respond, and he realized she was looking for him to confirm or deny the rumor.   
He shrugged. “I feel bad about that, actually.”  
“Why?”  
“Because I lied to her,” he whispered, sensing the truth in his words as he said them, rather than before. “I do still love Ladybug. Maybe I always will.” He turned to Marinette, seriousness consuming his voice as he did so. “But something changed, Marinette. Not just today. I think… I think I lost hope. And that’s not supposed to happen, is it? The whole purpose of love is to keep hope alive, not crush it. So over time I think I began to realize maybe… Maybe Ladybug and I were doomed from the start. Just not meant to be. I figured I’d go ahead and accept it now and move on with my life, rather than wasting more of her time trailing after her like a star-struck kitten,” he laughed a little and there was more joy than pain in it.  
Suddenly, he noticed that something strange was happening on Marinette’s face. Her brow had furrowed and her eyes carried an immense sadness that came from knowing a little bit too much. She bit her lip and looked away from him before saying softly, “Yeah. I think I know what you mean.”  
Chat Noir blinked. He wasn’t sure exactly what he had expected her to say, but it wasn’t that. “Y- You do?” he stuttered.   
Marinette smiled the tiniest bit and looked at him out of the corner of her eye. “You’re not the only one who's had it bad for someone lately, you know.”  
“You, Princess?” he asked, his mind whirling. “Wait! Who?” he felt silly because of the question, like he had been transformed into no more than a curious little school girl, and yet, he was desperate for answers.   
Marinette laughed uncomfortably. “You really want to know his name?”  
“Yes!”   
“Alright… Here goes…”   
There was a silence that seemed to go on forever as she hesitated. He took the opportunity to pull up a mental image of everyone in their class, which was slightly challenging considering how many days he tended to miss fighting crime. There was Marc, but Marinette didn’t seem interested in him, if he was even interested in girls at all. Ivan was happily taken, and no one supported him and Maylene more than Marinette, so that couldn’t be it. She had certainly never shown signs of liking Kim or Max… Had she? No. No she hadn’t.   
What about Nino? He could have sworn a cold sweat broke out of him at the thought. He remembered setting them up on a date that day he had fought Animan with Ladybug. Nino had been so nervous and Marinette had seemed excited. Really excited… No. This was insane. Nino was dating Alya, which was Marinette’s best friend, and Marinette definitely didn’t seem like the kind of person to secretly love her best friend’s boyfriend.   
Suddenly his heart stopped as he figured it out. Nathaniel. It made perfect sense. Even as a supervillain all he had wanted to do was go on a date with her - and who could blame him - and ever since then she had been madly in love with him. There were no other solutions. He shivered as he realized that was the same day that Marinette had first met him as Chat Noir. Of course that stupid striped shirt and purple had won her over over his black leather and dumb cat ears. Besides, Evillustrator had played music for her on a moonlit boat ride, all he had done was make bad cat puns, show off his practically non-existent muscles, and brag about how awesome of a superhero he was. Now she was going to fall in love with a former super-villain, hold hands with him in class, and one day they would get married, have triplets and move to New York and he would never see her ever a-  
“His name was Adrien Agreste,” Marinette mumbled.  
Chat Noir’s heart stopped. Adrien Agreste? But that was… That was him! Marinette had been in love with… Him? Suddenly, images flashed through his head, making him feel dizzy and overwhelmed with nostalgia and fresh realization. He remembered the umbrella in the rain and the way her cheeks had flushed red, the way her smile had lurched to outstanding widths every time he had been around, the stammering in the locker room when he had invited her to his photo shoot, and… And her kissing him on stage only for him to tell her the next day that it had all been acting. And maybe it had. Maybe he really had been Romeo on that stage, kissing Juliet, and not paying Marinette any mind at all. But not anymore.  
His feelings for Ladybug had been dwindling for a while, it was true, but his feelings for Marinette had been slowly on the rise. In fact, maybe he had always felt something stronger than friendship towards her, he just hadn’t been willing to accept it because he had wanted to have a chance with Ladybug. But that was all in the past now. He was in love with Marinette Dupain Cheng and - she may not know it yet - but once upon a time, she had been in love with him too.   
He wasn’t sure what to do next, he wasn’t sure what the smartest play was, all he knew was that his heart was pounding unusually hard in his chest as he looked at her, and for the first time let his love for her wash over him, far more powerful than any kwami or akuma ever would be.   
“I don’t know, maybe it was a pipe dream this whole time,” Marinette was muttering almost conspiratorially under her breath, wild hand motions accompanying her words. “I mean he’s a model after all, and Chloe practically glared machetes at me everytime I looked his way. I mean, not that I care what that daddy’s girl has to say, anyway, but it still bothered me. Of course, Alya always said I had a chance with him, but I think a part of me always knew that-”  
“Marinette,” he whispered, and suddenly he couldn’t think about anything but the way her name sounded on his tongue and the fact that she was everything he had ever wanted and more, even though she didn’t have a red and black mask over those perfect eyes.   
She turned towards him, though words still tumbled out of her mouth, her movements growing increasingly exasperated, and her tone of voice climbing higher until he could have sworn she was squealing like a pig, but he didn’t care. He didn’t think about the fact that all he needed to do to have her in the palm of his hand was apologize on Monday for what he had said and tell her he loved her in the locker rooms before drama practice. In fact, he didn’t really think at all. He just scooched in closer to her so they sat side by side, and cupped her chin in his hands, admiring how delicate she was, like a rose, or a lotus, and then, he leaned in and kissed her.  
Her hands had been flying wildly, her mouth going a mile a minute, but as his lips touched down on hers the words stopped and she went completely still. For a moment a paranoia of the highest degree filled him to the point of making him want to cry because last time he had kissed the girl of his dreams she had pushed him away, and this was just as much of a risk. But then that fear melted away as Marinette threw her arms around his neck, deepening the kiss, and sending all over thoughts but his love for her down the drain.   
And for the first time in a long while, he forgot to wonder about Ladybug. He forgot to worry about how she was doing or theorize about who she was behind the mask. Because he found that he didn’t much care. He had all he needed right here in front of him, and though she had blue pig-tailed hair and stunning indigo eyes, her name was not a mysterious riddle - one as small as an insect, but as troubling as a labyrinth, all the same. - No; her name was Marinette, and right there in that moment, with Paris shining below them, he felt like he had loved her for centuries, and more than that, he believed he could love her for centuries to come. 

 

Marinette’s eyes were closed and she could feel tears tickling her eyelids quietly, a subtle tingling sensation on her lashes. She had been talking about Adrien, and though for so long his name had slipped off of her tongue as if by default, this time it had been so hard to get the simple words out. Then, finally, she had done it and a blissful feeling had watched over her, like a cleanse of some sort, only for the words to come pouring out faster than she ever could have imagined. It was like with that one singular confession the dam in her mind had broken and everything had come flooding out. She hadn’t been able to stop, she had been panicked, and angry, and frightened, and the stress had gnawed at her, and then suddenly Chat’s lips had landed on hers, kind and poetic in their intentions, and everything within her had stilled.  
She hardly remembered throwing her arms around his neck, only the thrill that had trilled through her as she had. Now his hands had traveled downwards from her cheeks and were now cradling her hips in a sweet unexpecting sort of fashion as if all he really wanted was to hold her again. Again… Her mind darted back to the passionate hug they had shared less than ten minutes before. Somehow everything had changed since then. Because here they were holding each other once more, and yet, the intimacy had soared to new heights, leaving her breathless and aching for more.   
She wasn’t sure when she had realized she loved him. In fact, she had no clue at all. Was it when his hands had found her hips, or when the two of them had slowly stood up, hardly balancing on the thin gate, but still clutching onto each other, her eyes still shut as their lips found one another’s again and again and again…? Or was it before the kiss had ever even happened? Was it back so long ago when she had first met him, tangled up in her own yo-yo, his face so close to hers as she had struggled to master the burden of being Ladybug? Had her contempt and competitive nature towards him been only a cover- up for her true emotions this whole time? Her head spun, from the thoughts just as much as the kissing still raging on between the two of them.   
It was an interesting sort of kiss. It wasn’t forced and awkward like her kiss with him so long ago, it wasn’t delicate and full of hesitation like her kiss with Adrien, and it wasn’t unexpected and cruelly ironic like her second kiss with Adrien. This kiss was a paradox. It was rapid, and yet, mind-numbingly slow. It was rough, and yet, satisfyingly timid. It was uncertainty incarnate, and yet, she had never been more certain of anything in her entire life than the fact that she wanted to hold him longer.   
No, she realized with a start. That was a lie. She knew one thing above all others, including her desire to hold him, and that was the desire to tell him the truth. How long had Chat Noir pined over a girl that he believed would never love him back? How long had Ladybug been the sole name on his lips, and the soul face smiling in his mind? And now here she was kissing him on a balcony, her heart beating ten times faster as his fingers grazed her side, and he still had no idea that he had gotten exactly what he wanted.   
Suddenly, Marinette realized that Dark Cupid was perhaps the worst villain of them all. Because he had given Chat Noir the pleasure of a kiss with the girl he loved, but he hadn’t been conscious of all his dreams coming true. To not tell Chat Noir that he had gotten what he wanted this time, would be just as evil as Kim had acted when the akuma had gotten into his jewel that haunted valentines day. Or worse, it was like leaving a love letter for your crush, without even signing it. That thought made her smile against Chat Noir’s lips.  
Slowly, she pulled away from him, her hands somehow at his chest now. Her eyes were still shut and she could have sworn she heard Chat mumble something under his breath, but she wasn’t listening. She had her own words to whisper.   
Lightly, with all the fear, and yet, all the peace in the world, she muttered dizzily, “Tikki, spots on.”  
She was scared to open her eyes. She was terrified, in fact. She tried to remind herself that this wasn’t the first time she had said those words in front of Chat, her eyes closed, and her identity only a tiny action away from being revealed. That thought didn’t help the queasy feeling in her stomach. What if Chat was disappointed? What if being around her was different now because he was still uncomfortable around Ladybug, making him uncomfortable around Marinette too? There was so much that could go wrong, because of three simple little words. She supposed those weren’t the only three words that were terrifying to speak in front of someone. Those words echoed in her head, making her spine tingle as she realized how true they were at that moment. I love you. Love…   
Love was a funny thing. It made you blush out of embarrassment, it made you hate others out of jealousy, and it made you confide secrets out of… Trust. She sighed softly. If there was one thing that couldn’t be debated about Chat Noir, it was that she trusted him. He may be cocky, annoying, a huge flirt, and really good at making jokes at the most inconvenient times, but he was the most trustworthy person she had ever met. She would trust him with her life, as both Ladybug and Marinette, one and the same. So she could trust him with her identity too.  
She opened her eyes slowly, a smile still pressed comfortingly onto her face from the effects of the kiss, only to see Chat staring at her, his eyes wide and his mouth open. Only… It wasn’t Chat Noir staring back at her. It was…  
“A-Adrien?”   
Adrien just stared at her, his blonde hair swaying in the breeze and his green eyes so wide they rivaled the size of the very moon above them. Slowly, he reached out his fingers and placed them with a feather-light touch upon her mask. He then pulled them away quickly as if the material had burned him, and stared down at his shaking hand. He looked back up at her. Then back down at his hand.   
A shuttering question came out of his trembling lips, so quiet she barely heard him. “Marinette?” he whispered. “Is that really you?”  
His eyes stretched even wider, something she hadn’t thought was possible, and he ran his hands exasperatedly through his hair, taking too lurching steps backward in his shock. - Only for him to lose his footing on the gate, causing him to plummet off the side of the structure, falling in slow-motion towards the ground.  
Her heart stampeded in her chest, and the only thing she knew anymore was pure instinct. ‘ADRIEN!” she screamed, and her voice sounded very un-ladybug-like. Her hand shot like a rocket towards her yo-yo, grabbing it in her shaking fist and chucking it downwards, towards the falling Adrien.   
It wrapped its way affectively around his waist, and she breathed a sigh of relief, only for the unexpected weight of him to cause her lurching forward. She flailed her arms uncontrollably with a screech the exact opposite of elegant. Suddenly, due to all the reckless motion, her body ceased to keep up, and her fingers slipped off the side of the yo-yo she had been holding, causing it to sink towards the ground.   
“Agahahaheiwho!” she screamed unnecessary loudly and grabbed the strand with her entire body so that every muscle seemed to be crushed into the cord, causing her to be standing very awkwardly on the balcony, her knees pressed tightly together, her back hunched, and her hands shaking as they struggled to hold on to Adrien, after she had somehow almost killed him even though he hadn’t even been here a moment before.  
Adrien just laughed and an exasperated mini-scream spilled out of her quaking lips as she began to pull him up. He laughed, and laughed, and laughed, as if he didn’t have a care in the world, until finally he was standing successfully back on the gate, his body so close to hers that her heart couldn’t help but soar even though she was in love with Chat Noir, not Adrien. Speaking of which… How had he disappeared so fast? She felt like screaming at her utter lack of knowing what exactly was going on here. Meanwhile, Adrien was still laughing.  
“What’s so funny?!” she snapped finally.  
Adrien’s laughter faded out and he smiled at her, his face beaming. He tucked a piece of loose hair back behind her ear and she felt her cheeks burn without her permission.  
“It’s you,” he murmured. “It’s been you the whole time Princ-” his words were cut short by another laugh, this one small, and sweet, and abrupt. “I guess I should call you Milady now…”  
Milady…  
“Chat?” she whispered, her mind suddenly screaming so loud she couldn’t hear her own voice.  
Adrien nodded, his smile breaking open so she could see the whites of his perfect teeth. Her head began to spin, finally piecing everything together. That slight mumble she had heard had been Chat Noir telling his kwami to detransform him, which meant that Chat Noir… Was actually Adrien? But that didn’t make any sense… She thought back to what had happened with Adrien slipping off the rooftop and her epic awkward fail of a rescue. Lucky Adrien. She had unintentionally made it pretty obvious for him to see the lines between Marinette and Ladybug blurring, but Chat Noir really being Adrien Agreste? How exactly was she supposed to accept something as preposterous as that?  
Every moment she had ever shared with each of the two boys - or she supposed just the one - flashed through her mind. In the end was there really that big of a difference between Adrien’s soft eccentric smiles, and Chat’s lost dreamy ones? She had seen Chat act gentle and empathetic when he was talking about Ladybug or helping citizens, and she had seen Adrien act smooth and flirtatious in the lockers when he had invited her to his fashion shoot. She remembered the way he had basically purred the words ‘Are you lying?’ leaning in with that small knowing smile on his face and that mischievous glimmer in his eyes. She remembered the forlorn yet unmistakably starstruck look in Chat’s eyes when he had confessed his feelings for Ladybug - it was the same silent dedication and romance that had been indicated by his poem.   
His poem. I wonder who you are, beneath that strong disguise. She almost screamed. Adrien hadn’t written the poem for Marinette, he had written it for Ladybug. Either way he had written it for her, she supposed. This was all so new and confusing and Adrien was looking at her like she held the sun and the stars in her palm which wasn’t exactly helping considering he was so stupidly distracting with his big emerald eyes and sunshine hair. The same as Chat Noir’s…  
She had never felt more idiotic in her entire life. How had she not figured it out? This whole time she had been in love with Adrien and she hadn’t even suspected his connection to Chat? Wait no. That didn’t make sense. Because she wasn’t in love with Adrien anymore. She was in love with Chat Noir. But now they were the same person.   
Her head hurt.   
Suddenly, her eyes widened and she reached out towards Adrien - or Chat, or Hawkmoth, or whoever the hell he was- and squeezed his arm, as realization flooded through her. “Wait,” she gasped, her voice rising higher and higher with each next word she spoke. “You mean to tell me, we were in love with each other the whole time?”  
Adrien’s smile fell and his eyes widened too. They stared at each other. And stared. Then, without a word they eased themselves off the balcony and sat down, their backs to her gate. She put her head in her hands, exasperation coursing through her like a drug she had never meant to take.  
Everything was coming at her so fast and she had forgotten that it was late and she should be sleeping and she was only remembering now because she was tired. She was tired. Suddenly, she began to sob. She didn’t know exactly why. It just all became too much. Her body shook and built-up tears tumbled out of her eyes, tracing long thin streams down her face. She sniffled, embarrassed but too confused and exhausted to stop the cries from roaring out of her.   
She felt Adrien’s hand on her shoulder, and she jumped. Suddenly she realized how she must look, sitting there, weeping like a child in her Ladybug costume. She must look like nothing more than an obsessive fan dressing up for Halloween. She must look no better than Chloe. She groaned. She didn’t feel like Chloe. Then again, she didn’t exactly feel like a superhero either.   
“Tikki,” she managed to wail. “Spots off.” Just like that, she was back, Tikki floating in front of her, concern in her eyes.   
Then Tikki turned and saw Adrien. A small smile came to the sweet red kwami’s face as Adrien’s kwami came tumbling out of his jacket hesitantly, as if not sure he had the all clear. Tikki looked back and forth from the black kwami before her, to Adrien, to Marinette, then back again. Adrien’s kwami did the same. Then both the little creatures bolted towards one another, wrapping each other in their short arms, only for their heads to get in the way and them to stumble away awkwardly. But Tikki was smiling. And before he could protest she placed a big fat kiss on the black kwami’s cheek. He batted her away half-heartedly, muttering, “Alright, alright, Tikki, that’s enough.” But there was light in his eyes that made Marinette smile.  
Suddenly, Adrien cleared his throat. “I… I’m so sorry Marinette,” he muttered and she wiped at her eyes.  
“For what?”  
Adrien’s mouth tilted and he scratched the back of his head anxiously, his eyes doing that familiar side glance she was so fond of. “Clearly this isn’t what you expected. I… I thought maybe you’d be happy to know that your crush was in love with you, but if that was too much I understand. Besides, you… You said you didn’t like Adrien anymore, but I guess I thought maybe if I…” he trailed off and his eyes met hers. She was shocked at how much desperation was dwelling in those green pits.   
Suddenly, she realized, as if for the first time, that she was crying. Chat Noir had kissed her, detransformed into Adrien in front of her, and now she was crying. She wasn’t exactly sure what the connection actually was, but she knew how it must appear to Chat. Or Adrien. Chat Agreste? Adrien Noir? She didn’t even know what to think of him anymore. But it wasn’t anything negative. She was thrilled that he was Adrien. She was. She just needed some time to adjust.   
“I…” she murmured, trying to find some way she could possibly convey all the emotions whirring in her head in simple words. But when she looked at him she got so lost in his emerald eyes that she forgot what she was thinking about. Once she finally remembered, the answer was so clear she wanted to kick herself for not thinking of it at first.  
She looked at Adrien. Looked at him long and hard, until she could practically see the cat mask lining his features, without really seeing a difference at all. She took his face in her hands, let out one last strangled sob, and then leaned forward and kissed him.   
Every other kiss she had experienced so far had had some sort of flaw to it. Her first kiss with Chat had been out of duty, not want, and her first kiss with Adrien had not necessarily been as genuine as she would have hoped. Her second kiss with Chat had been wonderful, but all of the secrets they had kept from each other had kept it from being truly great, and it had been those very same secrets that had also made her second kiss with Adrien so drastically awful. But this kiss… This kiss was perfect. It was shining, and deep, and emotional. It was fully intended and the consequences were fully realized.   
The reason she had pushed away Adrien the second time was because she had realized he wasn’t what she wanted. Now she realized he still was, she just hadn’t known it back then. Because she had wanted someone who loved both sides of her. That’s what she had found in Chat Noir. Which meant it was also what she had found in Adrien. But it was only fair to return that favor to the person she loved. An eye for an eye.   
A heart for a heart.   
Chat Noir loved both sides of her, and she loved both sides of him. He had fallen for the bold, protective, and focused girl with a severe sense of justice and the ability to wield her powers without difficulty. But he also accepted the compassionate, reckless, hopeful one, with the heart of gold, but a mind incapable of comprehending just what to use it for.   
She had fallen for the sensitive, shy boy with the tiniest hint of a smile that couldn’t possibly come close to properly conveying the shining essence of his heart. But, somehow, the cocky, arrogant boy who strutted along like the model he was in daylight, and who had no filter when it came to flirting or bad jokes, had also squeezed his way into her heart at the very last second, causing her to win this race with flying colors. And for all those reasons, and thirty thousand more, she knew that this love was beyond pure. It was beyond incredible. It was beyond unfathomable.   
This love was miraculous.


End file.
